Gimmick's Vice
by kerricarri
Summary: A jaded, older Jinx. A prison cell. A Titan visitor. The vigilante wants to know why certain tech is on the streets and is seeking the whereabouts of the terrorist Mikron, but not many are willing to admit they knew the urban legend from his Gizmo days.
1. G'V: Failed Interrogation

This is my speculation of how the future developed into the one seen in the How Long Is Forever episode, but of course this focuses on the H.I.V.E. because we all know the sad state the Teen Titans are in already. After starting "Desperation, Says the Villain" I realized how I stunted my own opportunities, so here we are. This fic is either Teen or Mature because it references bad stuff. How bad? Not sure, but it's bad. I'm trying to mix in a jaded bent to the tone the show already has. 

The chapters will be sporadically updated and so shouldn't interfere with Desperation. I pretty much know how this fic ends.

That said, I wanted to write a firmly villain Jinx who would fit within the confines of the postulated future. No happy-happy Jinx here, peoples. The premise is Gizmo grew up into Mikron (who is DC canon), who had some sort of reign of terror in the country before he got offed. Time passed and 'Mikron' became an urban legend, but now suddenly a new Mikron shows up. Jinx is not happy. Superheroes aren't happy. Hell, even Cyborg's not happy because he's tired, middle-aged, and old at this point but gets dragged into the mess anyway. What inspired me? Well, the episode for one. And the 1995 crime movie, "The Usual Suspects." 

* * *

"How do you know if he's even still around?" A coy smile played at her lips, even if her eyes were inscrutable as ever. "It's been twenty years, kid. Wouldn't you think the guy would be dead by now?"

"Gizmo was a boy before the Catalyst—"

"We were _all_ children before that disaster, kid. You don't have to remind me."

"Tell me what you know," the Titan said in a low voice, fists shaking. "Tell me it now."

Unexpectedly, she barked out a laugh. "You? Give you the info? What're you gonna do, kid? What can anybody do now? Word is the city's been hell since I've been slammed."

"People are dying!"

"And you're an idealist. Even if Mikron _exists_," she drawled, "he's hardly going to walk up to your doorstep and nicely give you a solution to all your little problems. The point of terrorism, kid, is to keep it alive and_ going_. Playing hero and going after the bad guys is not helping the situation any. Actually, I think you're part of the problem."

"The problem! You're a criminal! You don't know what you're—"

"Oh, I know plenty enough." Her eyes narrowed while her slits of pupils widened and fairly _glowed_. "There was once a merry band of Teen Titans who thought they could do big things. Great things. Well, look at them now. One bint up and leaves and the rest of the team falls apart. Did that wretched Cyborg tell you where to find me? What about that one freak wonder downtown?"

"Don't talk about them that way!"

"Who are you supposed to be, kid?" she sniffed. "Some tidy widy superhero who's barely out of his cradle?"

" Stop calling me a kid! I'm _Kid Flash_. Get it right!"

"Oh, so your mentor being dead is reason enough to declare yourself as such? You're, what…in your teens? A bit of a misnomer, don't you think?"

"He died because people like you killed him!" Kid Flash gripped the edge of the table, furious. "It's because you people exist that he died! It's all your fault!"

Something flickered in the criminal's expression then, but then it hardened. "Let me tell you a story, kid. Let me break through that rose-colored lens of yours."

"I don't need to hear anything you have to say. All criminals do is lie!"

"So you don't want that info? A certain terrorist is in the story. It also deals with Kid Flash, the _real one_. Your boy mentor."

"What does Wally have to do with Gizmo?" he said warily.

Her grin was positively catty. "You're actually not sure how he died, are you? No one is. Did you know Wally West once dated a villain? It's true. _Boy Wonder_ of the Teen Titans found out and it was hardly something he could let on by, right? Too ingrained with righteous injustice. Too full of hate. By then Starfire of the team had long gone. Nightwing doesn't have it together, does he? Never mind the fact that he's of Gotham origins and is the Batman's protegee!"

"You're rambling," he cut in. "Get to the point."

"If you don't know how he died then I suppose _I_ don't really know how he died. After all, I'm just a criminal, one of the last vestiges of metahuman freaks from before the Catalyst still around on this side of the country. How did you end up here anyway? Last I heard, you were dallying around with some league or another—"

"There's an illegal trafficking of biotechnology, a kind of weapon that's threatening the populace. I tracked it here. Its origins are from Mikron, formally Gizmo! You know this, but thousands are being threatened right now."

"You can't stop it. You can't fight it. You can only wait until all the humans drop dead like the flies they are...? Don't look at me like that, kid. Gizmo wouldn't have pulled this off. That kid died before the Catalyst," she said easily, "and I very much doubt he'd come back from the grave for this."

The Flash glowered. "You're lying," he growled. He slammed a fist down. "Tell me what you know!"

"I'm the only H.I.V.E. operative around with information about your supposed Mikron and you're not going to believe me? That's fine. I'm going to die anyways. Let's see where you end up then. It's simply a matter of who breaks first and, kid, I'm not talking anytime soon." Her smile was amused. "You have all the speed in the world at your disposal, but you don't even have the advantage of time. You failed from the start once you decided to rely on me."

"You have to help me."

"And why would I? Why should I be making this any easier for you? What's in it for me?"

His face tightened in frustration and she leaned back, smiling. "You can't say it can you? You can't offer me a way out of this."

Face scrunching up, Kid Flash spat, "This is where you belong. In prison!"

"And on death row," she said dryly. "I didn't do much. I'm a petty robber compared to this Mikron guy of yours. He's the one you should be focusing on, not catching individuals like me. No need to kill us off when you've got a big, bad terrorist on hand."

"You hacked into hundreds of companies and sent them bankrupt. Because of you, economies had fallen into depressions like the one of the last century." Disgusted, he glared at her to which she only shrugged. "In some ways, you're worse than Mikron. You were only in it for the money!"

"Look, it's all business to me. Don't tell me today's superheroes don't rely on hacking, either. You're all such hypocrites. Vigilantes? Give me a break. You're all in it for yourselves, too. There is no honor. There is no glory. There is only survival and the means to do so. And the only means to survive is through money. I chose my path and now I'm going to pay for it, but," she slowly drew up a smirk, "if I'm going down, the rest of the world will go down with me. So I destroy some countries. Big deal. Millions of others have dominated the Internet and millions more will do so. Anarchy will be our legacy. The H.I.V.E. is growing. You can't stop us."

"With your death it'll serve as a precedent for others," he whispered. "Don't you care?"

"Of course I care," she sneered. "Now go run along like a good boy and catch your Mikron because I'm not helping."

* * *

This Kid Flash character makes me cringe. In that crippled, straggling world, idealistic young superheroes are popping out of nowhere like daisies and the clash of old and new metahumans are just ugly. With 'Kid Flash' I tried to bring in an element of the old universe twenty years back, the one of those bright and shining Teen Titans. I don't know Bart Allen's DC Comics history and I don't care; I probably badly skewed the timeline by making him in his 'teens' at this point in time. Wally West is really dead and he's not coming back; how he died was purposely skimmed over because I haven't quite figured it out yet. Some other characters are also dead and aren't coming back, and Jinx only thinks she knows Gizmo's dead. 

This takes place technically at least twenty-one years from How Long Is Forever as this 'future' is set in motion after Episode 60: Lightspeed. Gizmo will not be an actual character despite what this fic's character listing says, but you bet he's a huge part of it. He is that important. No, there is no romance in this fic. The only 'romance' will be in flashbacks of the doomed, star-crossed KFxJinx pairing. Wally, not Bart. Ugh. Beyond that, this fic is character-based and so I'll explore what happened to the others. 


	2. G'V: Folly of Cooperation

Hm. Twenty years in the future and keeping characters completely canonical is asking a lot. The only person I really tried keeping in character while making her my own was Jinx. I did it by playing off that same coy, cocky attitude she had back in Episode 3: Final Exam and giving her a more doom and gloom Raven outlook.

* * *

"What'd you do now, Gizmo," she muttered. "'Mikron,' indeed. You would've loved it."

The criminal settled back into her seat, seeing no reason to discomfort her bum by sitting upright like a prim, proper young lady. _I haven't thought that way in years_, she thought dryly.

In the last ten years, the world had descended into hell. The Cataclysm had been fast, brutal, and unrelentless, stretching out into a period of three years. Three years of chaos. Other continents had been mostly spared from the North American disaster, but the sudden plunge of the country's economy, social order, and livelihood had immediate effects on the rest of the world. The event had crippled hundreds of nations, both east and west. Some of America had been spared, but the rest did not go unscathed.

Jump City had long been in ruins, now a decrepit, half-hearted jail for the truly despicable and a playground for the rest. It was forgotten and had ceased to exist on the map.

It was why the appearance of Kid Flash had been such a surprise. She didn't think any superhero, even the passionately inclined, would have bothered with the fair harbor city.

Soon to be executed, she wasn't too worried. The government was slow in these things, had been ever since the Catalyst, and she knew full well she wasn't dying anytime soon. It was depressing to be holed up in a prison, though, with wardens just as hardened and cruel as any of your second-rate villains.

Yes, she thought, villains were commonplace nowadays.

She needed only to bid her time, be patient. The System was biased, corrupted in her favor, and she wouldn't allow herself to languish away in some cell anyway. She was far too valuable for that. If she had to die, she would do so with a bang.

A little...bad...luck. The next time Kid Flash came by, she would be ready. She'd only been caught off guard this time because she hadn't seen that vibrant, childish spandex suit in so long.

It'd simply been...unexpected. Jinx never thought she would see that costume again and certainly not on some punk kid with delusions of grandeur. Who did that boy think he was, barging in here with unreasonable demands, bringing up the past—

The bastard. She hadn't thought of Gizmo in nearly ten years. Her little brother was an acidic, festering spot in her heart, something not to be reminisced casually over biscuits and tea. Gizmo did die before the Catalyst, and that little boy thought she was lying—?

Something hummed in her system, then, a throbbing, wrenching sensation in her veins that had her eyes snap open aglow with inner fire and—_no_. She was in control. _She_ was, not her powers...!

The thrum went away and, exhausted, she closed agitated eyes shut. Rubbing temples to make the sudden headache go away, to no avail, Jinx scowled in earnest. With no outlet for her magic, it was slipping in ways to show itself. She hadn't had this problem until she was incarcerated, either. An annoyance, a bothersome one, but nothing she couldn't handle.

If only there was a computer around. But the guards weren't stupid enough to leave one lying around, not even a piece of scrap metal. At least, not the kind she had in mind. She needed a focus to draw its attention away, a proverbial bone to throw in order to distract it so that it wouldn't be such a pain in the—!

Patience, she chided, jabbing a pulsing temple.

Her magic was so troublesome. How the hell did that Raven woman deal with her powers?

"Still in the asylum, thus utterly useless to me," she muttered, sighing. Seriously, when she would get out of this hellhole...

She went still. Snapping her head up, she peered into the darkness beyond cell bars and demanded, "Who's there?"

There was a step, distinctly metallic in sound. It rang harshly in the silence, even if the shuffling was heavy and unsure, and Jinx still couldn't identify the newcomer. She wasn't alarmed, though. The bars weren't just there to keep her in—they were there to keep everything out. Everything and..._everyone_. Who was visiting her this time? As the silhouette came closer, she'd begun to make out the person quickly and finally realized who it was.

"Cyborg..." she drawled out in distaste. In response, the man stepped fully into the dimming light of the window. His body was in sharp relief, but his face was still obscured by shadows, with only a single, glowing eye shown in clear view.

He said nothing, only stared. He hardly moved at all so Jinx could almost mistake him for the robot he was.

"Come now, Titan," she cajoled. "I'd thought for sure you'd be rusty parts by now. No one bothered to take you apart? What a shame."

"I'm on my last battery," he quietly said, "and I am no longer a Titan. You know that."

"Of course I do. I only felt obliged to ask because you're here. What do you want?"

"You know why I'm here."

"Why you moved your screeching ass to my part of town? Please, it can only do with the current scandal. Why would you act in the capacity of a Teen Titan, though?" She flippantly gestured at his dull armor. "You've been long out of a job, Sparky."

Something flickered in Cyborg's human, weary eye, so fast she almost missed it. As it were, she didn't and, pleased, she smiled, happy that he caught onto the reference. 

"Don't call me that," he said.

"Bumblebee was your friend, right? So was the others...not just _honorary Teen Titans_, but your actual team. Beast Boy, Raven, Sta—"

"_Don't say their names_!" he barked, slamming a fist into a wall. 

The room had shaken from the sudden action, vibrating the cage that was her holdings, but Jinx only cocked her head in a curious sort of manner. "Why not? All of you lost touch. You shouldn't care for them. Even if they may not be dead, aren't you to them?"

His cybernetic eye did nothing to hinder his all-too human glare.

Her smile dropped and suddenly she was all business. "What do you want, Cyborg? You haven't visited until you fixed the...security up and that was years ago." The pause along with her eye sweep roll did wonders in showing her opinion of the additions. "I thought you're on your last leg? What would drive you to such stupidity as to use some of that energy for little old me, huh?"

"You're freed."

A brow delicately arched up. "What d'you say?"

Cyborg gritted his teeth. "I said, you're _freed_."

"Oh. Well, that wasn't nearly as fun as I thought it would be. No need to be displeased. My lawyers must have done a pecking job—"

"It wasn't your lawyers. You're on probation," he said, "to help us catch _this guy_. You're lawyers didn't do anything."

She paused. With her head cocked to the side, she drawled to the side, "And who might you be?" They kept her room very dark.

But someone stepped up next to Cyborg. Vibrantly colored, the teen snapped, "That's right. We're the New Titans, and this is our show now!"

Both brows raised up high. "Kid?" she drew out skeptically.

"Until the probation ends," Cyborg murmured, "you're in our hands."

Looking wholly unimpressed, her sneer was ugly and refined. "How fun. A criminal, a wannabe, and a robot."

"Don't forget me."

She stilled, then spun around to face the voice. Her expression was no longer impenetrable or nonchalant. "_You_." Stalking forward to the edge of her cage, she snarled, "Traitor to the Five. Traitor to our lives! You _bastard_; I thought I told you to never show your face again."

A placid countenance was all she met. 

Her face pulled back into a ferocious grin, a wild and nasty one. "I can't believe you came back after the stunt you pulled. You killed nine of my operatives and I don't take those deaths lightly,_ See-More._"

His single eye narrowed on hers, See-More responded quietly, "It's Seymour now, Jinx. You're to work with us. Cooperate, else Mikron will kill us all."

"Oh, he's not the one you should be worried about," Jinx breathed. "_I __am_. And you should be very afraid."

* * *

Two lines are taken directly from Episode 60: Lightspeed. I like the slight 'coincidence' of Jinx saying that last one because it parallels Madame Rouge. Didn't Rouge once imply Jinx wanted to be just like her? 

I placed the timeline sometime before Starfire shows up since Cyborg is on 'his last leg.' I don't know if I'll bring her in here, but it's doubtful because the only reason I'd do so was if I wanted to make a contrast between past and future and Kid Flash already does the job nicely. More naivety to come, obviously. 


	3. G'V: Edicts

I'm sorry to say I really can't stay consistent with the type of dialogue the characters use, like using contractions of d'you or y'know, stuff like that. Jinx does it because she likes to drawl a lot. Cyborg does it because it slips in his speech sometimes, a mannerism from his adolescent days. Kid Flash does it because...he's Kid Flash. My poor 'Seymour' grew up to be a really depressing guy. He talks solemnly, formally almost. He's become quite articulate, that one, but he'll have his flustered moments, I think.

But! In this chapter Bart gets a reality check, drugs are mentioned, and Jinx says bad words. You'll also get a taste of her expertise here, but not much. If you're in total disagreement with her hacker occupation, then keep in mind this is twenty years in the future, Gizmo went hardcore and they stayed friends, and the current world status is if you have the money and the tech you have power. I also want to clarify something: She's been in the same prison in and out over the year, but if she stays she's staying there for a reason because she can get herself out when the need arises.

* * *

"Why d'you think Gizmo's still around?"

Seymour frowned. "Why do you keep bringing him up?"

"Mikron doesn't _exist._ Not anymore."

"And if he does, he had to have come from somebody, right?"

Jinx lips pressed tight against her face. "You know he died back there. Don't go bringing up the past where it should _stay_ in the past. Mikron is a myth. A legend, even. Your new allies are doing nothing but grasping at straws."

"But we have proof, Jinx," Cyborg broke in, "so you oughta just be quiet."

She sneered at him. "I don't even know why I'm here. I'm not doing anything for some Titans Reincarnated or whatever. You guys are supposed to be _dead_. Jump hasn't seen that kind of activity in a long time. What makes you think you can set up operations in _my_ city?"

"Exactly why you're here." Kid Flash scowled. "You're going to do exactly what we say."

Expression droll, Jinx said, "And I'm going to help you why...?"

The boy sputtered. "You get to get out of jail. You should be grateful!"

"You think I'd rather not be languishing away in a cell? Take me back. Clearly, whoever thought of this idea wasn't right in the head."

"You're going to help us." Cyborg's voice was weary. "You can start by telling us why you're so reluctant to search for an urban legend. You can slip away at any time, but while we're together we're in this _together_."

Kid Flash squawked. "Cyborg, you can't be serious. She's on probation! You can't tell her she can go anytime she pleases!"

Cyborg ignored him. "What do you say, Jinx?" His gaze was steady and unflinching. "Fine, then let's say Gizmo _isn't_ the one behind all of this. We both know prison's not going to be able to hold you in for long. The only question is in the time you're out will you help us find who's desecrating his legacy? Or will you let yourself be locked away in your cell in denial? The choice is yours."

Jinx stared. "You're serious. You're actually serious about this, about catching Mikron." Her head jerked in her old teammate's direction. "And you got him roped in because of that very same ultimatum, is that right?"

Seymour said nothing.

Cyborg's voice was low. "Will you help us?"

Her eyes closed, and a faint sigh played at her lips. "What've you got so far."

"The technology's documented roughly around ten years ago. Lost technology. It's old, but effective. The guy planted—" Kid Flash broke off, annoyed. "Yeah, I found all this out. What are you giving me that look for?"

Jinx was still staring at him, but for an entirely other reason. She gave Cyborg a look. "Please tell me the kid's joking."

Cyborg was unsmiling. "We need your help. Badly."

"Obviously. Seymour," he tilted his head at the acknowledgment, "what's the H.I.V.E. been doing?"

"Distribution. Not the weapons the kid's been talking about, but it's a standard lock-down standstill; they're waiting for orders."

"Do better than that, one-eye. Find out what they've been _doing_. If Mikron's really been at work, they should've been whipped into a frenzy. Unseen. Professional. Get the files I want. They won't be parading them around, you understand."

"Of course." Seymour sounded slightly affronted. "I'm not that detached from my roots."

Jinx didn't respond. Looking at Kid Flash, she snapped, "You're fast, right? Go get me a computer and don't bring me a desktop, either. Get me a_laptop_. The smaller, the faster, the better."

The teen looked scandalized. "Those things cost a fortune. I can't get you one of those."

She stopped her eye roll just in time. Swiftly turning towards Cyborg, she drawled, "I'm going to need your Tower for this. Don't worry, I won't exert your energy supply too much for what I've got in mind."

"Fine," he said.

"Wait! You can't have the Tower!"

"I don't see a laptop yet, kid. If you can't follow simple instructions like that, how the hell d'you think you can operate on this team?" She scoffed at her last words. "Whatever. If you can't even _steal_ some damn tech, go and get one of those weapons, our fabled tech. I want to see for myself exactly what we're dealing with here. The more, the merrier. I want them all."

"What are you going to do with the Tower?" Cyborg asked quietly.

"Have you tried networking? Connecting to the mainframe of the city?"

"Can't," he said, reply terse. "Not enough power."

"Ugh, god, why can't you people just _steal_ stuff?" There was no answer. "Fine, fine! I'll do it myself. If the kid doesn't have the stomach for it, get some battery cells off of dealers downtown. I'll charge your carcass _myself_ if I have to."

"I'm going to check the old Academy," Seymour imputed.

Jinx gave a flippant hand gesture. "Don't bother. The moment I was incarcerated, those guys probably hightailed it to second base. You'll want to check the highway towards Steel."

Seymour's eyes widened. "But that's..."

She wasn't quite glaring, but it was getting there. "Titans East won't be giving you any trouble. I made a deal with them a long time ago."

"What is going _on_?" Kid Flash burst out. "You wouldn't give me any info. You wouldn't help us out. And now, suddenly, you're the leader?" He turned towards Cyborg, pleading, "What's the matter with you? Why are you letting her get away with this? _We're_ the heroes, but she..."

Looking tired and old, Cyborg laid a hand on the younger man's shoulder and said, "Bart...do what she says. She knows it's to her advantage to cooperate with us for the time being. Without her, we really wouldn't be anywhere."

"But how can you trust her! She's a...a criminal!"

"...and then come back," Jinx was saying; she had stopped listening to the argument long ago. "Seymour, you'll want to watch out for Roy Harper. He may be Speedy, but he's the Robin of the team. Hotheaded, temperamental—he won't be listening to any of your pleas if you get caught, never mind the treaty."

"I'll keep that in mind," Seymour said.

"Oh, and he gets off of Harry Jones sometimes. You'll want to watch out for that when it's his turn to patrol."

"_Harry Jones_?" Kid Flash was frustrated and his face showed it. "What are you guys _talking_ about?"

"Heroin," Cyborg murmured. "Speedy has a habit."

There was total shock on Kid Flash's face. "You're telling me a _superhero_ does—"

"Cyborg," Jinx cut in. "Get the kid out of here. I need to get to work, but I can't _work_ without a computer, now can I?"

"Come on, Bart," Cyborg said gently. "We have to go. We can't stay here for long or we'll get targeted."

"Y-yeah...you're, you're right. Let's go." The young superhero's face twisted into something like determination, but it was too much of a grimace for that. "I'm outta here."

He immediately ducked under Cyborg's hand and sped off, never looking back. The old Titan looked regretful before glancing at Jinx with reproach. "Was that really necessary? He didn't know any better."

"Did _we _know any better, Cyborg?" she spat. "What about Gizmo? And your precious Starfire? Playing around like children was what got them killed, and what did we have to show for it? I shaped the Hive up while you guys went to shambles. This is the world we live in and Bart Allen is the most idiotic child I have ever dealt with if he is still that naïve."

"The kid was his ward and looked up to the guy," Cyborg said, a little coolly. "The Flash you knew was just as jaded as you, but the Flash_ Bart_ knew was his friend and mentor. Let him have his hero worship and keep _your_ views out of his way."

"He will die," she snarled, "and when you have his broken body in your arms, don't you dare grieve for him because his death will be on your head. It will be your fault because you didn't have the heart to break him in!"

Something tightened in Seymour's face then. He stepped forward. "Jinx, that's enough—"

"I don't give a flying fuck about any of you! All of you can go to hell."

Angrily, Seymour opened his mouth to respond, but Cyborg shook his head. "Let it go," he urged. "Hurry and go check up on Steel, Seymour. We need to get started."

Jinx scowled and pivoted. "Screw this. I'm heading for the Tower. Go and get me a damn _computer_ or I will deplete the rest of your resources, fuckin' tin can."

There was a flash of recognition in those startled eyes and Cyborg jerked to a stop. He was looking at her strangely. "What did you just call me?"

She never paused in her walking. "I have a lot more where that came from so hurry up and get me what I _want_ already!"

* * *

Jinx acts a little differently outside of jail. Less languid and more down-to-earth. She's under a bit of stress right now and dealing with the new incarnation of Kid Flash pisses her off. When she looks at Bart, she sees him and she sees the Kid Flash costume, but she doesn't see _Kid Flash_.


	4. G'V: Steel Will

And here we are at Steel City, which is no longer the Steel we all know and love. Think of Starwars's Coruscant. That being said, how did the future change Titans East? Or, more aptly, how much of the future was changed _because _of Titans East?

* * *

The skin around Aquaman's eyes were tight, but not wrinkled—his skin was much too smooth for that, impossibly so. He was also glaring, his form taunt and ready, but more wary than anything. "What are you doing here, Hive? We agreed we would never see your faces around here."

"I want to talk to your leader," the intruder said calmly.

"You're looking at him right now."

"Where is Bumblebee?"

The Atlantian's lips curled a little. "You're a little slow, aren't you? Our leader was killed two years ago. You should have known this already. A Hive was responsible for her death, after all."

"I hadn't been part of H.I.V.E. since the Catalyst."

His eyes widened minutely. "You're the one they call See-More, the one who betrayed the H.I.V.E...What do you want?"

"Mikron."

"Give me something else."

"What his relationship is with the H.I.V.E.. I want to know if they have anything to do with him, where they've been, and what they've been doing since the sorceress was captured."

Gaze blank and voice cool, Aquaman answered, "As if I'd know such a thing like that. The H.I.V.E. doesn't like Steel City so there haven't been a lot of activity here on their account."

"And Blood?"

Hate definitely entered those opaque eyes now. His words came out brittle and cold. "Get what you came for, but don't expect to leave if you pursue the matter. You have twenty-four hours, Hive."

"What's Blood been doing in Jinx's absence?"

"Hivemaster Blood is our problem and ours alone. You need not worry about him."

"I have strict orders," Seymour said softly, "and I will get the information out of you willingly right now or not at all, which is unacceptable."

Aquaman went tense. "Should I be perceiving that as a threat, Hive?"

"Only as a plea. I don't want to fight you. Exert your energy for elsewhere because I'm not the person you should be fighting. Mikron has poisoned our coast. How long will it take for his taint to reach your city? Can you stand before the fury of his army?"

Aquaman thrust a hand out towards the ocean. "I have Atlantica at my command, the fish at sea, and all legions below and above belong to me. The terrorist's technology will not harm this land, not while I am alive to serve its people."

"I am not saying you're incapable, but do you have measures put in place against even biotechnology? Disease, cancer, and rotting filth will seize this country and ravaged everyone on this continent until there is no one left. You control the fish, the sea, and tempests and zephyrs obey your every command, but can you stop Mikron's nanotechnology? The city lives under no rule except an authoritarian's rule. It's wild, underdeveloped, and archaic. You will die."

"No one will die," Aquaman hissed, "not while the true heroes protect the legacy of this world. If I should die then I shall die by destroying every one of you who dare to threaten my order. Mikron will not succeed, I tell you this now. I will not bow under this threat and I will not bow under his technology!"

"Then you are a fool," Seymour said quietly, "because you will not look past your own arrogance to the situation at hand. You will willingly blind yourself with pretenses and false security. You will not listen nor will you even consider an alliance outside of your territory. You have led Steel into isolation and the city has paid for your decision."

Aquaman's face twisted into a snarl. "We don't need a foreigner to presume as such! Titans East, under my command, has led this city to prosper amongst the aftermath of the Cataclysm. Had I not have continued our leader's great work in keeping this city alive after it had been hit with such disaster, there would be no Steel! We would be as inconsequential as your Jump City!" His eyes glittered. "And your Mikron does a fine job in helping its anarchy along."

* * *

Aqualad/Garth in this universe responded to the Catalyst in his own way. He's also a relic from the past because he still calls the superhero gig valiant and true. The impression I got off of him from the show was someone who was honor-bound and who took his responsibilities very seriously. As you can see, his powers are crazy developed and, yes, he said Atlantica, not Atlantis.

The chapter was short, but it did its job. I didn't actually do the foreshadowed Speedy confrontation because I really didn't know how to pull off a druggie. Hive being in Steel is important and you'll want to take note of Blood's 'new' title. I thought it was cute.


	5. G'V: Prompted Nostalgia

Hm. This fic is turning out to be quite dialogue dominated. I hope you guys don't mind. Otherwise, here it's all about the past so I finally lay some groundwork for this gloomy future. I adopted the name Elliot from fandom and there's another brief mention of drugs. Explanation for DC Comics cameo at the end.

* * *

"In jail, it never looked this bad," she muttered.

"There are a lot of things that look worse from the outside of a prison. Mikron is one of them."

"There is no—"

"Look," Cyborg said tiredly, "the guy goes around calling himself that. Mikron was a supervillain who left something to prove, and this guy is it. He stole Mikron's blueprints and then let the finished products loose on the streets, so don't tell me Mikron doesn't exist, just...don't."

"I wasn't going to." Jinx looked annoyed. "I was going to say there's no interface set up between this Tower of yours and the city, but if you're going to be like that..."

"Oh." Cyborg's lips twisted downwards and he sounded properly abashed. "Actually...it is. Connected, I mean."

"Good. I was getting a little worried you would say no. Now, let's get down to business. What does it take to get this craggly, old building up and running?"

"More power than available," he replied.

"Right now, you mean," she dismissed. "If I can get a hold of some Xenothium it'd be a whole another story, but the U.S. was stupid enough to cut ties with China and now we have punk kids snorting imitation crap up their noses."

Cyborg flinched. "Do you have to be so blunt all the time?"

"...Superheroes," she sighed.

"I'm not one anymore." His tone held a warning.

She ignored it. Giving his hulking armor a firm tap, Jinx drawled, "No, I don't suppose you are. Just how outdated are you?"

He shrugged her off. "Old enough. It's not important."

"Oh, but it is." She smirked. "I'm going to need you to move your metal ass once the kid brings some of Mikron's stuff."

"What? Why? What are you planning...?"

"I'm going to need to read their specs, right? That means I'm going to need to _connect_ them to the Tower. Once I've done that and brought this shack up to speed...well, pretty spectacular things will happen."

"And you need me for this...why?"

Jinx huffed. "I may have captured it once before, but I hardly know the ins and outs of its structure. I don't know a thing about this Tower and that's where you come in."

A slow smile started to form and there was a ghostly glimmer of pride in Cyborg's eyes. "I see how it is. You need me."

"Please, I just want to get this over with and hacking this place would be like...is this place even functional enough to be hacked? It's almost as outdated as you, you know."

"Get on with it then." His voice was strained from her snide reminder. "I want this done as much as you do."

"Times really haven't been kind to you, huh." Jinx tapered strips of coating off the thick wires in her hands. Grunting, she added, "And I don't suppose you know how to construct a containment field, either."

Cyborg raised a brow. "I'm not that ancient. Get me the supplies and I'll give as good as I get."

"Well spoken, Titan. You want a gold star along with? You're the first person around here who actually have the balls to admit that the old ways are dead and gone. First decent superhero to come out of that damn Catalyst."

"I've had twenty years to change, Jinx, and ten to cope. I'm not about to take my experiences lightly." Cyborg crouched and took the wires from her hands, working on it, too. He ignored her surprise. "I'm not above helping you out. We _need_ you, but I know you really don't need us. The others...the others aren't around anymore to protest. I trust you, y'know?"

Jinx stood up, brushed herself off, and tugged the wires from him. "You're the only one who does," she muttered, before murmuring something under her breath.

Before Cyborg could even ask, lights flared from the wire and sparked. The durable material suddenly disintegrated into plastic flakes and floated harmlessly to the floor. Jinx started to walk away.

"Wait! That was...that was amazing." He stumbled to his feet, reaching out with an outstretched hand. "Jinx, you...you controlled your powers. So precisely that you hadn't even damaged the insides! How—?"

"Hardware breaks down. Flesh rots away. But magic...magic never depletes. It never goes away. Always lurking, always _there_...Cyborg," her body was tense, "this must never get out. I haven't used magic in probably as long as you must've kept that same armor."

Brows furrowed, he asked, "But why? You didn't have to show me it, not when I know it must be some great secret to you...why did you show it to me?"

She stopped to glance over her shoulder. "I need your help and it has nothing to do with Mikron. I need your _help_, but I need to know if I can rely on...you for this."

"What is it?" He noted her desperate expression. "What's wrong?"

"Let me go."

"You know I can't—"

"No. You don't _understand_. Let me go. I need to do something before we really go after...Mikron."

Cyborg frowned. "What's so urgent that you need to pause everything now?"

"That's all the magic I have in me. Don't you understand?" Jinx pivoted, insisting, "It all can't just go _somewhere_. The reason for such control is because there isn't even that much to control!"

"No way..." His eyes were wide in shock. "You're losing your magic? That can't be. Magic gets stronger over the years."

"That's with _Raven_, buddy, and I'm not even your typical sorceress." But underneath all that bluster, he saw that Jinx was really worried. "Think about it, my powers are—"

"Bad luck?" Cyborg's eyes were narrowed. "I still can't believe it...your own powers are hurting you in the longer run."

"How do you think I felt when I couldn't even bust an engine anymore?"

"This is bad." He started pacing. "_Really_ bad. What're we gonna—"

"Nothing. You're not going to do anything. I didn't tell you any of this to garner any of your sympathy or crap. I only told you because I need to get things in certain order. My...powers isn't even the real issue here."

"There's more?"

"Years ago...and I mean _years_ ago, I contracted a virus. Long story short, it screwed around with my system a bit and my magic went haywire. That was when hexes first started to...fail on me."

Eyes wide and speculative, Cyborg said slowly, "And you didn't go to the Titans for this? We never even heard you got sick."

Jinx huffed and looked away, glaring. "It's not like any of you could've help. It was all I could do to keep West from running around like some goddamn chicken. Besides, why would the resident Titan _goth girl_ want to help me? None of you even liked me. Even you were wary of me, weren't you?"

He opened his mouth.

"Don't bother," she snapped, turning that glare onto him. "Robin wouldn't trust a supervillain on the fly. Of course I understood."

"So what did Wally do?"

"Nothing. When the operation came, I knocked him out myself."

His brows rose high on his forehead. "What operation."

"To stamp out the virus! It's not like I subjected myself to some creepy, metal implements." She sniffed, chin cocked high. "I trusted my doctor explicitly and underwent the procedure."

"And it _worked_?! Some shady operation you went through and, like that, you were all better?"

"I'm not dead yet."

Cyborg groaned. "Don't tell me nothing went wrong. A situation like that is just asking for it."

Her chin lowered a fraction. "Yeah, well...I was the hiccup in the gene pool. It wasn't like anybody knew what the hell was wrong with me so we went with...magic."

"Oh, this has to be good."

"Shut up. If I had some freak disease targeting my powers directly to get to _me_ why wouldn't I fight magic with magic? Of course," she drawled, "you wouldn't know a thing about magic, would you?"

"...Sounds like tech factions going at each other over the same turf."

"Fine. Use your little analogies—maybe you do understand. But something...something did happen. Something bad."

"The suspense is killing me, Jinx."

Voice low, she muttered, "In the process of ridding me of my disease, someone else caught it. I was okay, but that person _wasn't_ and it was my own damn fault. I hadn't thought things through and—"

"Who."

"...Elliot." Jinx jerked her head away to avoid looking at his shock-filled expression. "I'm guessing you guys were friends during your time at the Academy, huh?"

"No..." Cyborg stumbled back, face pained. "Not him. Why...? How did this happen?!"

She sighed. "Go on and blame me. I know you want to."

"Where is he? I want to see him. I can—"

"Impossible." Her voice was whiplash sharp. "There's no one in hell you can see him."

"He still alive!" Jinx didn't even flinch when he clasped her shoulders. "Where is he? Tell me!"

"So you can do what?" Snarling, she twisted under his grasp and stepped away. Her eyes burned and had she the magic to activate them they would've glowed. "What can you possible do? What makes you think you can even start taking care of another human being when you can't even take care of yourself!"

Cyborg stepped back as if slapped. "You...you don't know what you're talking about! Elliot's my friend. I would never—!"

"Only I can get to him. Not you, with your stupid, clunking hull. Not even the kid because of that hideous outfit of his. He'd catch attention faster than you'd be able to walk out that door. The only one who can find Kyd Wykkyd is _me_, and you're not holding me back!"

"I..." Cyborg sank to the floor. "I just I can't believe it. I thought...he was dead. All these years, I really thought he—why didn't you tell me, Jinx? I could've...maybe I could've done _something_. I was young once. Powerful. I could've done something—I _know_ I could have!"

Exhausted, Jinx leaned against the wall. Her face was tired, with eyes closed shut, and she didn't even seem to have the energy to frown anymore. "I've been taking care of him for awhile. He's not at his hottest, to tell you the truth. We only went through with my operation five years after I contracted the disease and..." A faint _something_ flitted in her expression, then, something nostalgic. "Elliot was so pissed. Was hell bent on patching me up, damn my superhero status and the other Hive."

"So Wally didn't know either."

"Until the whole thing was dragged into the into the light? No. I didn't want him to know." Her lips quirked and her smirk was half-hearted. "West was always such a softy, can you blame me? Damsels in distress and all that...I couldn't let that happen. My pride was at stake. The Titans at my front...the Hive at my back, with only Wally West for company at my side."

"When...when did you—"

"Thirteen years ago. It took two years to figure it out, but Elliot did it. He...gods, his magic was so strong then. Probably could've kicked Raven's ass any day, but he was only interested in _saving_ me or something silly like that. Went behind the others to do it, too."

"Three years until the Catalyst, huh."

"Yeah..." Jinx hid shaking hands in her pockets. "Same time..._he _died."

"And I never knew," Cyborg whispered.

"Don't get me wrong. Even though you were annoying as all hell, I was still—well, I'm not going into that whole sap, angst story. You know me. I picked myself up and dived headlong into the chaos."

"Everything's all wrong." He turned around. "This future. The Titans. Me, you...it shouldn't have ended this way."

"There are a lot of things that shouldn't have ended this way," she replied. "You just have to keep on going."

"How did you keep going after...you know. It's not like you immediately got back into the supervillain gig. There was that year where..."

Jinx stood, brushing herself off. "Yeah. The missing year? Before the Catalyst no one knew where anyone else was. I was traveling, picking my way through the country. Aimless. I didn't know what to do. Hell, Washington didn't know what to do."

"All of their reforms were useless."

"Those poor politicians. Remember No Man's Land? That was a mess. I hightailed towards the west coast after I heard the news. Didn't want anything to do with that place."

Cyborg grimaced as a thought struck him. "I remember. It was a national disaster. Nobody here cared, but Nightwing went crazy. We lost touch afterwards. And then..."

"The Catalyst. I know."

They both fell quiet, and then Jinx gave a scoff. "Look at the two of us. We're like a couple of old geezers thinking back on the good old days."

"Not good. Bad. We haven't once talked about the _really_ 'good old days,' yet."

"Do we have to?"

He could easily recognize the bitterness in her tone. "No," Cyborg said finally. "We don't. Let's not go there."

* * *

No Man's Land happened not too long after Tim Drake's time which makes Batman: NML 'officially' a part of this fic's past 20 year timeline. Therefore, there are two Cataclysm events in this universe: canon and mine. Gimmick's Catalyst is an earthquake, too, but it's a man-made one. I honestly did not mean to make my Cataclysm so similar to canon's; I had completely forgotten Batman: Cataclysm existed. Many apologies, but mine is different. You'll see.

Otherwise, that's the most blatant crossover I'll ever do in Gimmick's unless I drag Nightwing in. I think I will because that guy is too chummy with Jump to just happen to be there when Starfire shows up. I'm not buying it—I demand an explanation. So there you go, a future chapter to look forward to if I can muster up the courage to tear poor Starfire's delusions to shreds. That should be fun, but don't hold your breath.

Yes, that's the disease Jinx has in DSTV. DSTV is most certainly not 'canon' here, though.


	6. G'V: Forgone Abstinence

Funny, my other fic was supposed to be predominately KFxJinx and here's my first attempted romance-anything between them in a whole another fic. It's nice writing content!Jinx, but I'm much more comfortable writing in the angst genre than writing anything cute, sweet, and sappy.

* * *

There was a lilting, teasing quality to his voice. "You're working hard."

Pausing, she leaned back into his arms, looking up at his face. "We can't rely on the Titans forever. I need to do this. For myself."

He smiled down at her briefly before turning serious. "You know I'll protect you however I can, right? I wish you didn't have to do this..."

"Yeah..." She closed her eyes and murmured, "I wish I didn't have to either."

Head bowed, he nuzzled her neck and hair that was left down for once tickled his nose. She felt lips twist up against her skin. "My girl's so independent, sometimes I wonder if she even needs a man."

Turning into his hold, she smiled into the folds of his shirt. Hidden. Content. Adoring. "Don't even joke like that," she whispered. "I'll need you forever until the day I die."

His cheek rested on her head and she heard his sigh, heavy and weary and tinged with something foreign. Something dark. "I know. But how long is forever?"

Jinx wandered in the bathroom in a daze. Yawning widely, she tripped and twisted the shower knob. Testing the water, she gave a sudden hiss and wrenched her hand away, but her smile was a pleased one. "It works," she said, shoving the curtains aside.

Bliss. Moaning, she ducked her head under the stream and stood there, greedily taking in the water. Absently wondering whether she should save some for the local relic, she shot the idea down with a snort. The damn tin can hadn't bothered with hooking the place up with running water so it wasn't her fault if she used it all up.

In prison, to shower meant to risk voyeurs. Not to mention, the water was cold as hell. She was glad she was out. Her comfort level had been at stake.

Scrubbing herself down and cursing when there was no soap, Jinx finished and stumbled out, already missing the heat. The air around the Tower neared sterile, even stagnant, in that untouched, dusty way. It was not necessarily dirty, but Jinx could have afforded better.

She was under house arrest, unfortunately. Her jailer had these mechanical puppy _things_ that patrolled the place for him, but if Jinx had her way there wouldn't even be any need for that. He was like a grumpy old man sometimes, never looking beyond to what the future held and the innovations available if one only looked around. Honestly, if he wasn't an ex-Titan, she would've overhauled the whole damn place already.

Cyborg was at her door right now. With a flourish, she flung it open and glared at him. "Are you just going to stand there and follow me around?"

He looked away, flushing. "Get decent."

"There are no towels."

He stoically handed one over and she snatched it away. Hastily wrapping it around herself, she brushed past him. "Did you reboot the mainframe? It crashed when I was trying to install stuff on it last night. We're going to need some of those files I asked for, but Seymour's not back yet. And where is _Kid Flash—_?"

"You were crying out for him. Last night."

"Who? The kid? Don't be ridiculous."

"No. Wally."

She tensed, so visibly it was hard for Cyborg not to have caught it. "Like I said," she replied without turning, "there's still a lot of work to do."

"He said the only thing you ever cared about was him. After he was gone, what was there to stop you? You...you still haven't told me why you went back to being a criminal."

"There a point to all of this? Hardly a time to start pointing fingers." Jinx about-faced. "Dontcha think?"

"I want to know something." Cyborg really didn't look like he wanted to interrogate her, but it was inevitable. Their talk last night was a spontaneous, mutual agreement, a one-time understanding that wouldn't happen again. They both had known it, too.

She didn't hold it against him. "Go on."

With a sigh, he started. "You're a nationally wanted hacker. A minor one, but still wanted. There was no way you could have gotten that good that fast. They still tell stories about you and your first hit, of how much it reeked of Mikron's M.O.."

Jinx cocked her head. "I admit Gizmo and I accomplished many things. He created Mikron not long before our partnership and it consumed him. He was no longer Gizmo after that."

"Why is catching Mikron so important to you?"

"Didn't you say it before? It was Gizmo's legacy. We may have split paths after he turned towards bigger, better things, but he was still a teammate. A friend. Is it so hard to imagine that what the H.I.V.E. Five shared was something akin to the Titans' friendship?"

"I don't buy it."

Something darkened in her face. "Do you deny it then?"

"I don't buy it _because_ of the way things are. Look at the H.I.V.E. right now. They're...Jinx, they're strangers."

"Strangers to you," she countered, "but it's where I belong. It's been my home ever since I was a child. Who're you to deny me my own home?" Eyes hooded, there was something raw to her voice. "I'd rather have been beaten in a jail cell until I pissed red blood then to work with heroes, but...here we are. Funny how life turns out, ain't it?"

Cyborg stepped forward and inclined his head until they were eye-level. She saw that he was serious. "Just tell me one thing."

"What," she murmured.

"When were you planning on telling me that Blood's the Hivemaster now?"

Jinx's glare was freezing. "Found out about that, did you?"

"Yeah." He looked at her grimly. "Seymour did come back. He had some very interesting things to tell."

Her eyes flared. "And does Seymour owe his allegiance to you? Am I allowed no freedom at all in this wretched alliance? Probation. Hah! I can't even walk out the front door without having you all going to pieces in fear that I'll leave you to the problem of dealing with a Mikron _incarnate_ all on your own!"

Shoulders slowly relaxing, Cyborg smiled at her a little sadly. His expression was soft. "You're so defensive, but I wonder if I wasn't the cause of it. A little girl once showed me that villains were human, too, but I shoved it aside in my anger. I was once one of you, but I never _saw_ you. We never saw criminals as anything more than serial numbers to be put in jail..."

"And now?" she demanded.

"Now, I'm thinking we were wrong all along." Turning, Cyborg started to walk away. "I'll give you one day, Jinx. One day to take care of your affairs, but after that you're in this for good. By that time Kid Flash," he chuckled, "should have gotten a computer for you."

Long after he'd gone, clunking away in the only way he knew how, Jinx still stood there. Towel clenched tightly in one hand, she never noticed how soaked with water it was or how transfixed she was. If she noticed her own shivering, she would've attributed it to the cold. It was probably was, but she never would have considered the possibility that she was thrown or even overwhelmed by the simple gesture to her unasked question.

_Let me leave?_

Jinx looked off to the side, fighting that smile no matter how small.

One-time understanding her ass.

Her half-smile slipped and her face suddenly hardened. "Don't be so quick to trust, Titan," she murmured. "You haven't seen anything yet."

Casually slinking through the hallways, she made her way to the common room. Her designated room was three floors away and she didn't feel like tromping all the way back downstairs just for some stupid clothes. She would do something about this place in the meantime. Bored out of her mind, irritable of her surroundings, there wasn't even a decent computer around to distract her! This from the famed Cyborg of the Teen Titans. And, honestly, after the battle she had to put up to wire some hot water to this harbor island...Jinx was sorely tempted to declare it inhabitable and toss herself off the roof only so that she could get away.

In her musings, she'd entered the common reason without having noticed—only to recoil. Dirty. Disgusting. Cyborg could have at least done _something_ to liven the place up! Whatever. Ultimately, it didn't matter. She was still working on making something out of the Titan mainframe. The first thing she did was to try and break through the Tower's rusted, senile access codes to get at the modem in the basement, but it hadn't gone well. Looking at the mess of a computer in front of her, Jinx had the suspicion the basement would be much more...accommodating towards her than working up here.

She wished she had the same appreciation for technology back then as she did now. Maybe then they could've snagged the T-Tower for permanent residency instead having to have gone back to that Slade bastard in failure. It was an inane line of thought, but a wistful one—

Damn. He hadn't even bothered to upkeep the ventilation! Hell, she bet there wasn't a ventilation system to begin with. That wide, open hole in the wall would've played hell on the bills, after all. The guy was probably still anal about paying heed to city laws and stuff, but there seemed to be some hope for him. Get him the supplies and he would build her a containment field as good as he got, huh? What a challenge...and what nerve.

As if she wouldn't already know how to build her own fields. Cyborg really was behind on the scheme of things if he didn't immediately retch at the thought of relying on a measly, archaic _containment field_. In the privacy of her own room, she liked to laugh at him in her own head. The situation was too hilarious for words.

She wished Gizmo was stilled around. She missed his flamboyant, silly swearing ways. Maybe they could've had a Cyborg-bashing session together in some lifetime or another. Maybe.

Gizmo would've known what to do with this hulking, stupid piece of junk, this _Tower_. Probably would've blown it to pieces, but she didn't have that luxury. Ever since she'd arrived, she'd constantly, irrevocably find herself at odds with the building and it wasn't funny anymore.

It wasn't receptive to her. It didn't like her. It never worked with her.

It'd been three days. She was getting impatient. The kid still hadn't brought her a stupid laptop. Seymour had skulked off to who knew where, probably avoiding chucking up those files for her. And Cyborg? Where was that pet stalker of hers...how odd it was to finally have her own shadow back.

"No time like the present," she muttered.

Without her metal 'shadow,' nothing was holding her back anymore.

Not a cell. Not a hero. Not the need for secrecy. Not even for the sake of manipulation. She didn't even need a laptop right now for what she had in mind.

Surreptitiously, Jinx slid grating doors shut and slapped a metallic tag on it to keep it closed; if someone were to try and break in, she would know immediately. The gel in that thin packet would explode noiselessly, painlessly, but quite brightly. Two seconds of flash was all she would need to immediately stop whatever it was she was doing.

For Cyborg, though, she thought it was overkill. The rusty tin can probably would have his arms fall off from friction in the strain of trying to pry open the door. Gods only knew he wasn't greased down. No wonder he moved like an old man.

She didn't bother doing anything with the gaping hole in the middle of the wall. It didn't seem worth the effort, but it did serve to provide unwanted breezes. With her wet, towel-clad form and the occasional presence of sharp chills in the room, it would be her silent reminder to get her ass out of gear as soon as possible.

She was worried if she got too into it time would fly right on by and where would that lead her? She was such a desperate masochist, though, maybe she would keep going, damn the consequences.

Jinx fought back a shiver and thought, _Not likely_.

Okay. Okay, she could do this. It hadn't been that long she could forget—

A lurch. Her shivers grew, but in unconscious, yearning response to that sweet, faint pull. Coaxing. Cajoling. Tempting. Teasing—she had teased it too much last night when she was making a point to Cyborg—_Hunger_.

There was a flare. A hot, white, blistering sensation, so quick and fleeting like a game of tag, and then it was roaring in her veins. Awoken. _Alive._

Her eyes, which had closed in her intense concentration, suddenly snapped open to reveal blazing, glowing orbs to the world.

Something sparked. It was her hand. She slapped it on top of the console and looked on gleefully as she brought the computer back to life _her own way_.

Gods, it felt like homecoming after having abstained for so long—!

Stop. Short-circuit only, she wanted to demand, but of course there was no need. Sentient. Playful. It wanted to jump, curl, unfold, but this was such a sensitive job. _Short-circuit only_.

It bent to her will. The fractured screen, the long-dead monitor, flickered to life, fluttering awake.

It had been rendered useless for years, dominating the common room wall as a silent fixture from the past—not anymore.

_It was good to be back_.

* * *

Ack. I have to watch out for how often I use the words face, expression, eyes, and voice. Description isn't my forte, but I had a lot of fun figuring out how to pull off the ending.

Yes, Jinx was BSing Cyborg in the last chapter about the bad luck nature of her magic. What, you thought I was serious? Jinx just isn't Jinx without her powers.

The original draft of Jinx's character, along with Gimmick's ending, were flavored by Othello's Iago in regards to manipulation. I scrapped that total-evil quality in the fic because I don't think even Jinx is that vindictive. I am going to bring the focus a bit back to her villainy side, though, and throw in some of the more darker aspects of Gimmick's. It's about time I give something concrete about Mikron's methods...past and present.


	7. G'V: Sleeper Agent

Jinx does some more BSing, Kid Flash gets another eye opener, and a bit of Cyborg introspective at the end.

* * *

"About time. Was it really so difficult to separate yourself from them?"

"It's only been a day. There was some commotion on the highway so I had to take a detour, and then that guy was all over me when I came back. He wouldn't let me go until he grilled me on the info."

"Whatever. So, what've you got?" she said.

"I gave the files you wanted to Cyborg."

"There are the files I wanted and then there are the files I _wanted_. Hand them over."

He sighed, doing as she commanded. "It was a lot of trouble getting a hold of these, just to let you know. I didn't run into anybody but Aquaman." He motioned the items. "The disks are what you want. The rest are decoy."

She gave a low, noncommittal noise, tucking the data disks into her pocket. Too busy flipping through the papers to look up, she murmured, "I suppose he wasn't too happy to see you—these are good, by the way. Useless, but serves its purpose." She finished, then gave her attention to him. "So what happened?"

"I asked after Blood. The Titan doesn't know any more than the people at H.I.V.E.."

"So," she drawled, "he's moving in already? I thought I told the big boy to wait, but he acted faster than I would have wanted..."

"Is that a problem?"

"No, not at all. He moved in just like I said he would. That old geezer is so predictable." She snapped the folder shut, smirking at him. "By the way, it's good to have you back. It was dead boring in that cell without you, Seymour."

Seymour inclined his head. "Likewise. It's good to be back...Jinx."

Leaning up against a computer panel, she seemed perfectly at ease. "D'you know how long I was waiting for you to get everything ready? I almost—" Jinx suddenly slammed him up against the wall, "—the hell's your problem? You're telling Cyborg shit when it should concern _me_?"

Seymour's face was immediately transformed with his sneer. "It's not like I'm still a Hive, _Jinx_. I don't have to report everything to you! Not anymore."

"Bastard! I still can't believe they accepted your filthy carcass for what it was—a traitor! You think you're a good guy now, huh? Is that how it is?"

"Whoa, whoa, _whoa_! Stop it!" Kid Flash had come between them, looking angry at what he heard. "What are you guys doing?! Get off of Seymour, you criminal!"

"Stay out of this, kid," Jinx snapped. "This doesn't concern your nappy ass!"

Kid Flash stood in front of her, never taking his eyes off of her furious countenance. "Don't you dare threaten Seymour," he said, voice deadly low. "He doesn't need any of your crap!"

"Bart," Seymour sounded frustrated, "you don't have to tell her that. She won't listen to you. Just leave it alone!"

"She had you up against the _wall._ I'm not going to stand by and let her get away with that!"

"What," a voice yelled, "is going on here?!"

"Cyborg," Jinx spat, turning on him. "Hurry up and get your pet dog under a leash. The kid threatened me—_me_!"

"That's not true, Cyborg," Kid Flash protested. "Jinx ambushed Seymour for no reason! She was going to kill him or—or something! I had to stop her. She was hurting him!"

"It's fine, Bart," but Seymour's voice was filled with disgust. "It's just a bruise. I'll get over it. She can't _hurt_ me." He glared at her as he said it.

Jinx shot one coolly back.

"Oh, stop with the antics. Everyone shut up so I can hear myself think!" Cyborg moved aggravatingly towards them. "I don't get it. Jinx, I thought I gave you what you wanted, but now you go after Seymour? And, Seymour, why—?" He swung around to look at the papers he saw. "The hell...?"

"There! That's what Jinx was trying to grab from Seymour," Kid Flash called out wildly.

Jinx sniffed. "I don't _grab_, kid. I snatch."

Cyborg slowly bent to pick up one of the scattered papers. His eyes widened. "These were the papers you showed me, Seymour."

"It wasn't me," Seymour said. "It was Jinx! She comes in and suddenly demanded for stuff that—"

"So that's the issue, isn't it?" Jinx slinked forward, laughter mocking to all. "It's always trust. You can't trust villains; they'll turn you out in a second! Well, I never asked to be here. You people want me to be here and in order to be your tool I must be _equipped_. I don't need to apologize for anything. I just wanted some damn information!"

"You only needed to ask, Jinx."

"Really. And would you have given it to me, Cyborg?"

"Of course I would have," he stated at the same time Kid Flash said, "Of course not!"

"It seems you hero types aren't on the same page so I'll just go now." Jinx sounded smug. "Can I leave or do I need someone to hold my hand all the way to the pissing room?"

"I'll go," Seymour said tiredly. "Don't worry, guys, nothing's going to happen."

"I'll come with!" Kid Flash declared, but stopped at the hand on his shoulder. "Cyborg?"

"Jinx is right, Bart." Cyborg heaved a sigh. "I gotta talk to you for a sec."

The boy scowled. "Are you going to talk to me about how villains are our friends or something?"

"Oh, goodie. An argument all because of me?"

"I thought you were going to the pisser's room?" Kid Flash retorted.

"Pisser's room, kid? I think you're confusing the potty for your room."

"Why, you...!"

"Kid!" Cyborg barked.

"Fine! It's bad enough _she_ calls me a kid, but now you, too?"

"Look, Seymour—I'm spreading discontent!"

Seymour dragged her away. "Come on, Jinx. No need to add sparks to their ire."

"But I like sparks," they heard her voice drift away. "It's so fun messing with the kid's mind, though, isn't it?"

They didn't hear Seymour's response, but Kid Flash gritted his teeth all the same. "That...witch...I can't stand her!"

"But you have to." Cyborg patted him on the back. "It's okay. She's good at messing with people's heads. Don't let it get to you."

"No! I can't! She—gah, she pisses me off so much." Stomping away from his friend, Kid Flash flung himself onto a couch. He looked to be in despair. "Why is she like this? Why does she have to be...I don't know—"

"Aggravating? Irritating? It's her way to cope, Bart," Cyborg said. "It's good to know not every one us old folk are depressing as hell."

"That's just it! That's exactly what I mean. Why isn't she depressed?"

"...And that makes you angry, why?"

Kid Flash brought his arm away from his eyes and glared at nothing in particular. "I would've thought her _boyfriend_ would have meant more to her, but I guess not."

Cyborg's mouth was slack open. "You knew Jinx dated _the Flash_? And you're okay with that?"

His arms waving around wildly, Kid Flash yelled, "Of course not! Didn't you just hear what I said? She pisses me off! He's dead and she—she never cared! And now...How can she do that? When he died, I...damn it, I don't get her at all!" Too angry to continue, too agitated to keep sitting, he started to pace, fists clenched. "She's so..."

"...annoying. Stop following me! I'm fine," Jinx spat. "Okay? I don't need your stupid superhero speeches or...or anything because I don't give a damn. Go away!"

A considerably younger Cyborg, but no less grim, didn't move from the doorway. "You gotta talk to me here, Jinx. C'mon, I know you need a frie—"

"Shut up!" she screamed, covering her ears. "Why won't any of you leave me alone?! I'm fine! I'm fine! Why don't any of you get that it doesn't matter. None of it does! I don't—care—anymore. I'm not hurting...there's nothing to be hurt over!"

"Jinx. Listen to me. You can't stop shutting out the world! You're not eating. You're not sleeping. We all care about you! We want to _help_."

Stumbling back away from him, she stopped when she hit the wall. Head pounding, Jinx slid down the surface, whispering, "He's not dead...not him...never him...he's not—he promised. He _promised_."

Cyborg cautiously stepped forward and then knelt. Gently bringing her close, he enveloped her trembling frame, murmuring, "What did he promise you? What'd he say?" He didn't tell her it was going to be all right—it never was. She wasn't even seeing _him_ anymore. She was...

But Jinx didn't answer him. "It's all over. Everyone's gone. E-every damn person who'd ever...I gave them up. _Why did I give them up_? So stupid. He's gone. He's gone. Why? W-what'd I do? I'm a good guy now...this doesn't happen to us. Why is this happening?"

"Jinx..."

Her shaking stopped. "I understand now."

"Jinx...? Jinx—Jinx, come back!" Worried when she didn't respond, he pulled back and shook her shoulders. "No...no, no, no—you are _not_ doing this to me, girl! You can't fall apart now! You're stronger than this. You—"

"—Cyborg? You okay there?"

The older Titan shook his head, dispelling the memory. "Yeah," he said, voice sober, "but there's something you should know, Bart." Without waiting for Kid Flash to respond, Cyborg let out a long breath and then continued. "The Jinx you know is working with us only because she wants to stop Mikron. She doesn't like you. She doesn't like me. I'll bet she likes Seymour more than the both of us combined."

"Even with his...betrayal thingy or whatever?"

"Even then," Cyborg said firmly. "Look, the thing about Jinx is she's selfish."

"You got that right," Kid Flash muttered.

"And she's only in it for herself. She's not here to help your or me or the populace. In her world, civilians don't matter as long as she can steal from them. Whether there's a little old lady about to get run over or if there's a world war going on, she doesn't care. She's in it for the money."

"I know all that! You don't have to tell me twice."

"But she cares about Gizmo whether he's dead or not. She's not as detached as she makes herself out to be. She's..." Seeing his stubborn expression, Cyborg shrugged. "You don't have to believe me, but I've known her for awhile and I'll tell it to you straight. When that girl dated Wally she had whole different agendas. Still snide, cocky, and rude, don't get me wrong, but at least she knew how to defend him when both sides were trying to tear him to pieces."

Kid Flash snorted. "_Both_ sides?"

"He and Robin had a falling out. A big one."

"No way! Why would Nightwing—?"

"That's just the thing, Bart, he wasn't Nightwing. Not yet. Nightwing's can be an ass, but at least he's reasonable at times. But Robin? Robin was hot-tempered and all for throwing villains in jail through any means necessary. He saw the world in black and white, and whenever he got startled or really worked up about something..." Cyborg grimaced. "Man, that was a rough year. We'd just defeated the Brotherhood of Evil and Robin was beating himself up afterwards for having getting captured in the first place. Jinx popping out of nowhere really didn't help."

"But you were cool with it."

"I didn't like Robin's attitude, but I could understand it. And Jinx, well...Wally's not stupid. If he said Jinx was reformed, then Jinx was reformed. She didn't give a damn about the Titans, but at least she played nice for Wally's sake. After a...teammate of ours betrayed us two years before we went Brotherhood hunting, we weren't really accommodating. Robin was on Jinx's case all the time, I remember. Eventually, after getting really fed up, Kid Flash—" Cyborg broke off, muttering, "Sorry."

"No. No, go on." But Kid Flash was still wincing. "It's just...creepy. He was practically my old man and it's—never mind."

"Yeah. I think I'll shut up now."

"But I...I kinda get what you're saying." Very slowly, Kid Flash added, "Jinx wouldn't have put up with all that crap if she really wasn't the real thing, right? So she really...really did like Wally."

Struggling to keep his composure, Cyborg finally managed a, "...That's the story."

Face scrunched up, Kid Flash was grimacing at his own words. "Okay. I get it. I wish I didn't, but I get it."

"Well, now you know."

"I'm...going to go."

"You do that."

Kid Flash couldn't have gotten out of there fast enough, but Cyborg only shook his head. Jinx had better thank him for this because he was sure had Bart confronted the issue with her...forget about Mikron, she would've chucked herself right back into that cell.

Sometimes, Cyborg really was nonplussed about Bart. Cyborg tried, he really had, to bring up the boy to the best of his abilities, but he hardly had it together after the Catalyst. Taking in a grieving, mourning little kid as a ward wasn't the smartest thing to do, but who else was going to do it? He would've given Bart over to his grandma, per Wally's request, but...

Like Jinx said, before the Catalyst no one knew where anyone else was. That year was considered missing because the entire western coast was seized with terror under the threat of Mikron and other like-minded felons. After Mikron suddenly vanished, the government denied his existence and, instead, focused on the national crisis suddenly upon them. Not even a year after Gotham was straggling back to its feet, too.

People wanted answers, of course, but they got none. Eventually, Mikron turned into one of those urban legends and the once-young generation of metahumans forgot about Gizmo. Nobody wanted to remember what happened back then, after all. The last decade was filled with relief efforts and everybody put the past behind them. Nobody wanted to even consider the possibility of such a _villain_ returning...

Jinx may have been a lot of things, but she never let herself become complacent or become overwhelmed with what happened. Maybe becoming a supervillain again was really her way of coping. Maybe it was the most comfortable option at the time. But she was smart, regardless of which side she was playing on. She did just as she said she had: She pulled herself together and kept the H.I.V.E. alive. Her family.

Surely the Teen Titans could have stayed together. Hadn't they been the best of friends? They had fought crime together, but in the process of being vigilantes...hadn't a bond formed? An impenetrable, unbreakable bond? Starfire was such a critical part of holding the group together, but shouldn't their combined grief, that mutual understanding between the four of them...shouldn't that have made them stronger?

Jinx had kept the bad guys together. Maybe it was a way to lash out against the world, a big "Fuck you!" to the society that screwed her over twice and had tossed her into a villain's role. But she had kept them together. They were still _around. _And the Titans? What did Cyborg have to show for his efforts but a broken down tower and craggly, old, empty battery cell?

In some ways, Cyborg had to admire her, if not envy her. The golden age of superheroes was gone. The Titans' mentors should have had their shoes filled in by their side kicks, their protegees, but there was no one left.

He didn't even recognize Titans East anymore. Bumblebee dead. Aqualad gone. Más y Menos, who knew where. Even Speedy was different—he no longer had that Robin vibe. He was...

It wasn't supposed to be like this.

* * *

Seymour's been a sleeper agent the whole time, has been ever since his "betrayal."

Iris West Allen is indirectly mentioned, but she's not pivotal. Cyborg took in Kid Flash for a time before he had to let him go because Bart was really hurting to get back to work. They don't act like guardian-ward because, if you noticed, Bart addresses Cyborg as an authoritative figure. They're really not that close.

Chapter 8 is dark. Nothing too heinous, but it goes in depth to what Seymour was doing when he was in Steel City. It covers Speedy and features an assortment of other minor characters, one of which gets offed.


	8. G'V: Steel Will II

This takes place when Seymour's in Steel City during ch4. I didn't have the heart to screw Más y Menos over, so here I have them fail as delivery boys and shout the word 'stupid' in Spanish.

However, this chapter is the darkest so far.

* * *

Toying with an arrow, Speedy stopped. He hadn't gone by that name in a long time. He shrugged off the thought, crouching behind a rock and preparing to take aim. So what if he forgot sometimes. It wasn't like his mind was fucked over or anything—

_There_.

Released, the weapon sped through the air, leaving streaks of metal in the wind. Steady. Calm. Roy released a breath.

Patience.

They hit. A scream. Grinning, he lightly stepped down the hill and made his way over. Sprawled against the trunk, the person obviously haven't expected the attack and was panting for breath. Had Roy been anybody else, his debilitating hits would have missed and maybe have become fatal. As it were, Roy wasn't anybody else and he never_ missed._

One for the wrist, pinned up against the tree. One for the neck, so precise it hadn't been a killing shot. Two more for the heels just because he could. Plus, the guy had been trying to run so it had gotten on his nerves...

He should've pulled a Hannibal and sliced the guy's Achilless' heels. Maybe for kicks and giggles, but Roy wasn't a slasher and he preferred the tried and true hit-and-run tactic. Less messy. Efficient. Clean, even.

He hated to engage in close combat. He avoided it whenever he could, he really did, and the last time he really enjoyed himself in that kind of fight was when he'd sparred with his wife.

She was dead now, so it didn't matter.

Crucifixion by arrow. The guy looked almost comical, in that hysterically not funny kind of way. A bad joke and—wait...

Roy stepped back and snapped his string faster than the scum could protest. Another yell. More blood. He shook his head at seeing some splattered on his clothes—exactly why he hated close combat. The blood! It was—

—_pounding, thudding, his heartbeat sang loudly, adrenaline in his veins. Sharp teeth grinning. Fast, hard, she came at him with that damned mask of hers and he wondered what would happen if he accidentally knocked it off to kiss her._

Roy crouched, setting bow aside, to stare at his masterpiece. The little worm was wiggling and he could've done without the belly fat rolling, but maybe...well, at least his other arm wasn't writhing anymore. Now, he really did look like Christ—

"—_on the cedar. __Attis on the pine. __Odin on the world-ash."_

"You know..." he drawled, "you could've gone quietly with me and we would've dealt with this nasty business at the office. Steel is very accommodating, you know." His smile was cheery. "All hail King Aquaman, and all that. What? You don't find it funny? Well, I do."

He skulked forward and the man panicked, frantically frothing at the mouth! It was disgusting.

It was a villain.

Roy stopped before his prey. His features were quite happy and his eyes were curved. In his eyes, there was nothing wrong with the situation. Nothing at all, of course.

_Raped. Beaten, black and bruised. God, how could this have...!_

He blinked, shaking off the sensation. The man was blurred, but that was fine. He could still see. He wasn't seeing the face of his dead kid. She wasn't dead. Of course she wasn't dead. Garth told him she was safe. Garth wouldn't have lied. Garth took care of them. Garth never lied.

Lian wasn't dead. There were no monsters in her closet, no bad men out to get them. No one was hurting her. She was safe. She was fine.

_D-Dad...?_

The bow dropped, and his hands slowly drew forward the claws that glinted in the moonlight. Like a bubbling, fish-bowl view, he could see that the man was screaming and he could see that suddenly the world moved lethargically and he could see that his weapons were poised, but there was no sound. There was no noise. He couldn't hear.

The man was gutted, and he gurgled forth rich, fatty blood. Something lurched in his stomach and he felt faintly ill. Roy never liked the fresh feel of a new coat. Not like the luxurious silks she liked to indulge in or the pretty baubles they both liked to give to their...

"Say hello to mommy for me, would you?" he whispered, eyes crinkling, then he gave one last wrench and pulled away. Flop! His arrows could hardly keep the dead weight up, but they miraculously stayed. He must have hit really hard.

"_Has anyone ever told you you hit like a girl?" Murmurs against his neck, breath rolling over. A warm, heady, soft press to his back. A ready grin at his lips. "Or are my blades truly that fascinating?"_

He wasn't the slasher type. He turned, smiling.

But his wife was.

"_Let me teach you how." Sharp teeth grinning. "...Kiss me."_

xx

"Kid..." he rasped, then paused. "Sorry, _kids. W_elcome back."

One brother smirked to the other, and they both turned to look up at the dealer. The one on the left grinned and his suit had the blazing symbol for 'positive' on it. The other brother had a suit with a 'negative,' and he was grinning as well.

They both held out a hand and gave a loud stream of demands. The dealer nodded, periodically shrugging at some parts, but all the while listening with his head resting on a hand. Even with a mask on, he looked bored.

He _was _bored.

"So...what you're saying is you little guys need the shipment right now?"

"_S_í!" was the resounding cry.

Hand waving them off, he drawled, "No can do, kiddos. The last one that came in was a free-for-all—I don't _reserve _things for the fish man. Yesterday, some agent from the H.I.V.E. came in and snapped it right off the shelf." Hearing an indignant squawk, he rolled his eyes, never mind that they couldn't see. "It's outta my hands. Look, I've got a hot date with the babe who paid me and a clientile to keep happy." The man tilted back his head and had a smug sort of tone, smirk apparent in his words. "Scram, kids. I've got business to attend to."

"Yes, little boys. You're in my way!"

Más y Menos swung around and blew the newcomer a big, fat raspberry. "TONTO!" they shouted before zipping away.

The door ripped off and crashed to the floor, and the dealer sighed, muttering, "Third time this week. Customer service _sucks." _Turning his attention to the visitor, he suddenly sat up. "Finally aged yourself there, old man? Haven't seen you since you were this iddy, biddy thing twaddling around ass-naked."

The aggravated, twenty-or-so year old man slammed a hand down on the counter. His face was pained, filled with humiliation, but his teeth was gritted in his determination. "It was those damned Titans!" he began dramatically.

"Tell me about it."

"I will! Those...those rotten, spoiled little children—they, how _dare_ they do this to me, to I—!"

"It's called sarcasm around here, Warp. You're young again because of those kids. C'mon, what's it take to live it up in this age and generation?"

"No puns!" he shrieked. "I have spent twenty years in this wretched millennium and I've finally found you...Red X! I know what you're hiding! Give me the Xenothium! I must have the Xenothium!"

Red X slumped forward, yawning. "Oh, is that all? You're going to have to take it up with the boss man on top," he intoned. "We don't handle Xenothium en mass and definitely not in cargo. You may be from the future, kid, but here in the twenty-first fucking century of the U.S. of A. we don't have the tech to hold Xenothium in a shiny, metal box. Wanna see for yourself?"

Warp sputtered, sounding outraged, but then his face contorted into a sneer and he swung his glowing arm around, laughing. "See this, boy? This is your doom! Give me the means to power my battery cells and I'll allow you to live!"

Red X looked at him, supremely unimpressed. "You're kidding."

"No! I kid you not!" Warp's smile was positively triumphant and nasty now. "You're a gimp, _kid_. You cannot defeat me, not I, Warp! Perhaps I shall spare your pathetic, little life if you will only give me what I want!"

The former thief cocked his head. "You so sure of that, old man?"

"Yes!" Warp screamed.

Red X shrugged. "Be my guest, but—uh—maybe you should turn around first?"

"Like I would fall for something as juvenile as—" Warp jerked back, eyes widened until pupils were mere pinpricks. They were suddenly bloodshot from an unseen, intense strain and his mouth gaped open, opening and closing like a noiseless fish. A beat passed and Warp stood there seemingly suspended in animation when he abruptly toppled over.

Blood pooling around his head the only testament to Warp's messy death, Red X only shook his head, sighing; he seemed to be doing a lot of that lately. He paused, snorting, "Shouldn't have called me a gimp, kid," he said before pushing himself away from the wall. On a wheelchair, he came from behind the counter and rolled over to the prone body.

Leaning over his folded legs, Red X reached down and grasped the knife sticking out of Warp's throat. It pulled free from the dead man's flesh in a series of jagged, rough pulls, but the murderer wasn't bothered by it. He tossed the rusted X-shaped weapon away from him, feeling strangely nostalgic.

He shrugged it off, silently commanding the chair to roll him away. State of the art technology, it had all his needs and comfort in mind while requiring no hands or a bulky computer to control the device. Red X liked it, had easily afforded it, but it was depressing all the while. He had to settle down for smuggling and snagging the occasional fun job, but was restricted to the shop. Not that he wanted to leave; after all, what were all those security measures for? To keep people in? Please.

He had already forgotten about Warp.

"One-eye," he yelled towards the back room. "When do you think you can bring Jinx's cutie ass on over here? I'm already missing her pasty-skinned face."

Seymour walked through the door, shrugging. " I don't know, man, but I have to take these files back to Jump. Thanks for the tip."

Behind his mask, Red X's lips curled. "Anytime, kid. You get your files and I get my free poontang after seducing that H.I.V.E. chick. Make sure to tell Jinx that her underlings are lax without her. Wouldn't want to puffen up those pretty cheeks of hers with color, after all. What a disaster that would be."

* * *

The Warp who died was the baby, de-aged Warp from twenty years ago. The Warp who wrestles with Starfire into the future hasn't popped up yet and wouldn't have the 'memory' of dying.

Death by rusty blade is Red X's specialty. If the slicing doesn't kill you, the blood poisoning will. Xenothium is useful because there have been twenty years of technological advancement. It used to be really common, but foreign relations between America and the rest of the world flopped. Trade failed because of the lack of trust and nobody wanted to do something crazy like invest in the U.S..

Speedy's wife and child, Cheshire and Lian, were murdered by some very bad people. He's a bit unhinged so pay no heed to his Crucifix fixation. I got that whole Christ/Attis/Odin line off of my bro's fic, which is seriously twisted.


	9. G'V: Remote Control

Extremely crude dialogue up ahead and a special someone makes a reappearance. Wally's death is referenced...! But then not explained. Sorry.

* * *

"I miss him."

"I know."

Seymour sounded tense, so she looked at him apologetically. "Sorry. I know you haven't seen him in...well, I know you miss him even more."

"I haven't been able to see Elliot in ten years," he said tightly. "Please believe me when I say I'm sorry if I give you attitude, Jinx."

"Now, I know you're serious." She tossed pink waves back, huffing. "It wasn't me who had the idea. Don't go blaming me when you were the one roaring for some action." Jinx stopped, grimacing. "Sorry."

"S'ok," Seymour muttered, steering them into a room. "Let's talk in here, okay?"

"Fine. Are you—mad at me?"

They both knew she wasn't talking about the conversation. A pause, and then he looked away. "I was. At first, I was mad at everybody. The guys, the Titans, you, me. Elliot...that kid didn't deserve it. So, you're right, Jinx: I was roaring for some action. You didn't know what to do. I'm not mad for what you chose. I'm mad for what you did afterwards."

"Seymour..."

"No! I have to say this now or I won't ever."

Jinx's lips were trembling, but her gaze never wavered. "Say what you want, then. Everybody's been on my case for it, so why don't you? Why did I turn villain again? Why did I hook up with Mikron's crew? Why did I turn hacker on all of you? Always...always accusations. No one bothered to learn why! Nobody wanted to—they all..."

She bit hard on her lips, and he saw that it was red. "I was...afraid, okay? I was scared of forgetting who I was. He...he understood, though. He accepted it! He loved me and that kind of stupid, dopey acceptance was something that I'd—I'm still scared. Sometimes, I'm so scared I can't fucking _breathe_."

"Then tell me why," he murmured. "Why did you let Mikron get away with the things he did. He was the one who tore us apart. He was the one who told us to forget about you. He was the one who wanted to throw Kyd out after what he'd done! After saving you! So, _why_?"

Her pupils, usually slits, were near pinpricks. "Gizmo and I accomplished many things," she replied faintly, from memory. "Gizmo...he is—"

"Gizmo's dead!" Seymour flung himself to his feet, stalking towards her. "He's dead and he's not coming back! He's _dead_, Jinx. Accept it. It's the truth!"

"He can't be dead. He can't be. After all," she smiled widely—cracked, twisted—and disbelievingly, "Mikron told me he went away."

He stopped because he'd almost stumbled. Seymour was shaking his head slowly, staring at her in disbelief. "Mikron told you _what_?"

"Mikron told me he went away. Mikron told me he'd come back someday. Mikron told me—"

"Shut up! When did Mikron tell you this—_when_?"

Jinx frowned, dazed, and her eyes glinted red. "Mikron...in jail? No, no..._I_ was in jail, yes. You weren't there, Seymour."

He shook her. "That's not important! Tell me more."

"You weren't there," she repeated, stronger this time. "You weren't there to see it. He'd...he'd come back. Gizmo! He was so close, but then..."

"And did Mikron," Seymour whispered harshly, "tell you this?"

Blank. She looked blank as she processed his words, and then she brightened. "Yes."

"How?"

"He showed me."

"Showed you."

Jinx's smile was dreamy. "Mikron told me to close my eyes and when I opened them again they were standing next to each other. Mikron's real. He's not a character. Gizmo's so talented. His creation's real. His greatest toy." She turned to him with the blind trust of a child. "Mikron told me he's real. I was even able to touch him, Seymour!"

His voice came out strained in an effort to keep it low; Jinx would not understand if he started screaming at her. All progress would be lost. "And what did Mikron look like, Jinx?"

"What did he..."

"What did he look like! Did he look like Gizmo? Is that who you saw, Jinx? Another Gizmo?"

Something changed in her face then, a flicker of recognition. Familiarity. And confusion. "He looked like...my second-in-command." She blinked and with every sweep of her lashes she looked more and more in control of herself. Anger. Her confused anger was good. "He looked like Blood, Seymour. Why did he look like the Hivemaster?"

"Because he _was_ the Hivemaster," Seymour spat, fury making his movements jerky. "Fuck! You've been controlled by him this whole fucking time! And I never saw it—damn it, I wasn't even there! He forced you to send me away. It was all _his_ doing!"

"...He didn't send you away." Jinx's voice was plaintive and low. "I did."

"Of course he didn't! You don't know what you're talking about now because—"

"He didn't send you away."

"Jinx, I have no time to—"

"He did not send you away."

He spun around, taken about by her cold words. "Wha—? Jinx, are you...you?"

She eyed him coolly, imperiously, almost. "If the Hivemaster ascended the ranks to my second and you were not there, what would keep him from controlling me?"

Jinx sounded—mechanical. "What's...going on." Seymour gave a cautious step forward. "Jinx, you're not you."

"I made a deal with Titans East. They would keep him under check if I would give them the opportunities to do so. The treaty was a farce—it was a mutual agreement between us two factions who were both aiming to eradicate Blood." Quieter, now. Much, much softer, she continued, "But I had not expected their leader to double cross me. With my proposed alliance, they saw this as an opportunity to not only rid of Blood—but of me."

"And..." Seymour whispered, "and what did Brother Blood do?"

"He climbed the hierarchy. Old and wretched, he wanted power again. He would usurp Jinx by first isolating her and then terminating her. With his powers of mind control, he would take over the H.I.V.E., as he had done in the past, and with the influence of using Mikron's name, he would be feared once more. Titans East would become inconsequential. The Justice League would be powerless. The country would be his—and then the world. But the first step was to kill the sorceress."

"And why," his hands were shaking as realization began to dawn, "are you referring to yourself in third person?"

"Can't you tell...kid?" Suddenly, that mechanical, raspy tone completely took over and Jinx no longer looked lost, conflicted, or dazed. She moved jerkily and her eyes were sharp, knowing. _Familiar_.

"Get out." Seymour's lips curled back into a snarl. He stalked forwards, hands itching to hit her. "_Get out of Jinx's body, you bastard_! You told me that technology was destroyed, X! You fucking _told_ me Jinx wasn't a pet project of yours! So, _why_...!"

"Don't unplug me yet, kid. Jinx went through this voluntarily." 'Jinx' clumsily groped the back of her neck and wrenched out a machine so small it had been hidden easily by her hair. It clattered to the ground, bloodied, but used. A pin that glinted obsidian in the light. A receptor—_a controlling device_.

"...You said Jinx went through this voluntarily. Tell me _why_."

"Look, kiddo," that drawl was a little awkward through Jinx's voice box, but it was still all Red X. "There are only two reasons why Jinx would let her body be someone's fucktoy. One, if that West kid was around, and since our girl's not into necrophilia, let's scratch that for this occasion, 'kay?"

Looking sick, Seymour snapped, "And what's reason number two?"

"Don't get your surly panties in a twist. Number two's if she needed an implant and, one-eye, _she needed an implant_. Blood's specialty is flesh and blood—ha, irony—but that's all the pedophile is restricted to. He can't hurt machines, kid."

Seymour let out a loose, aggravated breath. "I can't believe it. This is too rich. And Jinx agreed? She hates being controlled!"

"Believe me, Cyclops, I don't like doing this either. I feel like a fuckin' alien in her, and it's not just because of the sudden addition of tits and a poon. Hell, I'm not even getting laid and I can't believe I agreed to this shit."

"Then why did you agree."

"Ooh, temper. I can feel your anger and I'm not even really there. Better watch out, kiddo, because I'm handling some precious cargo here. You wouldn't want to mess around with Jinx's body, right? So let's get down to business. Blood's a bastard and Jinx's not stupid. I'm not stupid, too. Yeah, glare at me all you like, but when you've got two none stupid people in the same room together discussing the same stupid bastard, what's the result?"

"Oh, god, don't tell me..."

"Bingo, one-balls. Jinx knew it was only a matter of time until Blood screwed her brains to kingdom come. The only question was, how fast could she fuck him before he fucked her?"

"Does every damn thing that comes out of your mouth have to be crude?" Seymour demanded.

"Kid, when you're looking at a hot babe objectively, she's a hot babe, and Jinx is _it_. Be sure to give that incest thing a try. That ought to be fun."

"Sick, sick bastard. Get back to the topic."

"My pleasure," Jinx leered. "But afterwards it's gonna be you, me, and the roof of the T-Car." Red X had even manipulated her body to use hand motions along with. It was just distasteful. Seymour glared for all he was worth, but the guy couldn't have sounded any more gleeful. "Oh, you say Cy's car doesn't exist now, but a certain someone should be showing up soon. A certain...time traveler. I mean, c'mon, don't tell me you never wanted to get some of this pussy on top of the Titans' front porch?"

"I'd never...! You know what, I don't even want to know."

"Of course you do, kid, of course you do. Especially when we're gonna to rope in a certain bird boy along for the ride and have ourselves a threesome."

"God, speak _English_ for once!"

Red X stopped with the obscene gestures and Jinx flopped into a seat. He was perfectly serious because he hadn't even bothered to do anything with her except to borrow her voice. "Before I bring in Nightwing to our wonderful conversation, I have to explain a few things to you first."

"Wait, why is Nightwing—?"

"Now, now, kid, that's not even the first crazy our girl's pulled off. Nightwing's really in vogue these days," he sneered, "real avant garde, but that's not the point. The important part is that Jinx is too coward to come clean to you about—"

Red X broke off, swearing, and Seymour regarded him warily. "What are you doing, X," he deadpanned.

"It's Jinx! She's fighting the damn tech—gah, keep it _down_, woman, I'm trying to tell one-eye here that...fine! Damn it, forget it, kid! Too high strung to tell you, but too stupid by holding back, I'll let her get her own ass into gear."

"O...kay. Anything else you'd like to enlighten me with? Anything at all, besides the fact that not even you can handle Jinx...?"

"Shut it, kid," Red X snapped. "It was a bit of a blip between us, but now I have mommy's approval to come clean with _other_ things instead."

"Go on then. I've been waiting this whole time for something useful to come out of your mouth."

"There's been, what, a resurgence in Titan activity? Don't know what that's all about, but even before you went off and got yourself whacked out of H.I.V.E.'s favor, Jinx had a plan. Contingency plans all thought up in that pretty, little head of hers. What a smart cookie she was to think up of those plans."

"You're not going to tell me these plans, are you."

"Nope," he said, voice cheery, "because once I'm outta here, Jinx'll go back to being a happy drone for Blood. Wouldn't want to tip off the old bastard, right? As long as all those swirling thoughts of hers are tightly locked and tossed into the back of her mind, it'll be fine. But don't worry, the moment I've activated this pretty gem tech of mine, Jinx'll still be aware of Blood's deep-rooted _influence_ in her, if a bit put out she won't be able to do anything about it."

"That's even worse!"

"Hey, not my prob. Blood's orders are really vague, not concrete at all. The old geezer doesn't know what to do with her right now. He still thinks she's in jail. He'll keel over soon enough, so don't worry your, ah, head about it, kid. She wants to come back, but there's something I gotta tell you personally."

Seymour looked aggrieved. "What is it now, Red X?"

A beat of silence, and then he sighed, relieved. "Oh, good. She can't listen in anymore."

"What are you playing at?" Seymour said slowly. "What's so important you have to say it to me alone?"

"I know how Wally West really died."

Seymour stared. Red X made Jinx shrug, but it looked wrong. It made Jinx seem uncaring, unfeeling, and _they were talking about her dead boyfriend when she was right there_.

Voice tight, he bit out, "You sure Jinx can't listen in, X? Because you don't know how fucked over you would be if you tossed around gossip like that."

"This ain't gossip, Seymour." Seymour almost jerked back from the usage of his real name, but Red X went on. "It's real. I know how the guy got offed, and the story isn't something for bedtime chuckles and kicks. Trust me, I wouldn't want to toss around anything this personal to her."

"She doesn't know how he died."

"Oh, so you figured it out? Yeah, she makes it seem like she's tough and all, but she doesn't know how the kid died. It really grates her, but...if the enemy knew about that little tidbit, she'd be vulnerable faster than you can say 'hey.'"

"And who...who does she consider an enemy?" But the grimace on Seymour's face couldn't have been any more jaded.

And the aplomb on Jinx's face was all Red X's. "Everybody not her," he answered finally. "Everyone's an enemy. Her guard's never down, one-eye. Don't believe that girly school-girl thing she has going on with that sexy lingerie place down the district."

He coughed. "Lingerie?"

"Jinx likes her comfort, and prisons play hell on her. It was all part of the plan. She didn't get 'captured' every now and then to get cloistered up at some hole, kiddo. Blood may be 'Hivemaster' now or some other shit, but he doesn't have ultimate control. H.I.V.E.'s really gone to the dogs lately, and the last time Jinx really disappeared from the crime scene was two years ago."

"The same time Bumblebee died."

"You're catching on fast, kid, but not fast enough. Did you know that for a time Jinx _was_ Mikron?"

"What?"

"You heard me, one-eye. Mikron may have gotten himself offed, but there was still his rep to consider and our girl's a fucking bloodhound—smells opportunities miles away. I think she picked it up from the bastard when he was still running around calling himself Gizmo." Red X shook his head. "It doesn't matter. The public's fanwhoring died down and Mikron drifted off into obscurity as some dumb urban legend. But Jinx? Hot damn was that girl on the move. She became the stuff of myths...'nuff said."

"So then...all the time she did in jail was—"

"Pointless. A scam. Even if she got caught, high up people in the H.I.V.E. picked up the slack for her. Subtly. Blood never knew and always got that stroke-stricken heart beating faster and faster every time he smelt an opportunity that our girl's made apparent."

"This is...this is just so..."

"Mind blowing? Un-fucking-believable? Kinda makes you want to have sex with her just to see if she still has that hell yeah factor in bed, doesn't it?"

"No."

"You're no fun. And here I thought I'd find a fellow friend. We could've had something together, made loads of teaser shots at Jinx whenever she'd walk on by. Or maybe that's too much, even for you. It's just sex made up of words. Nothing to cringe over."

"Just how much time do you have on your hands? You think of incredible crap everyday or something?"

"One-balls, I'm crippled here. Not much I can do to distract myself when the next shipment's long in coming."

"How does that feel?"

"Just peachy, kid. I sit on my ass all day long while twiddling my thumbs. It's a blast."

* * *

Blood never noticed the mechanical implant in Jinx because Red X is that subtle and sneaky. I hope the whole controlling-Jinx's-body-thing wasn't off putting, though. It slipped in right after I was tempted to delete this whole chapter because I didn't like how Jinx was coming off as stoned or something.

Can you tell? Starfire's arrival is getting closer and closer...but I'll probably take the liberty of playing around with the events of that episode. It's decided: I'm going to do something with Nightwing.

Next chapter's Red X again because he's turning out to be a regular.


	10. G'V: Masked Lamentations

I don't like having Wally dead when he's so major. So, the first flashback is four years after Season5. The second is during the "missing year" before the Catalyst. The third isn't a flashback at all; it takes place when ch9 happens. We finally see some Bart-Time. I never did like naïve!Bart, so he'll break out of that superhero mentality eventually, but it's a painfully slow process.

* * *

"That gimp is so full of shit."

Jinx stopped to toss a haughty glare. "That _gimp_ taught me all I know."

"He keeps flirting with you," Wally protested. "He should lay off of you."

"Mmhmm, sound advice coming from you. You're a player yourself, moron. Who did I catch making eyes at that bint earlier today?"

His eye twitched. "Only because that waitress was totally digging me. I didn't do anything for her to go all 'come hither' on me!"

"Whatever," she sighed. "Look, I like Red. Red likes me—in a _platonic_ way."

"Not with those innuendos," he muttered.

"It's called bantering, Flash. Get it through your thick skull."

Pouting, he crossed his arms. "All right. All right, fine. Why did I agree to this again? And—why _are_ you so receptive to him? I mean, it's a little—"

She flicked his forehead. "Shut up. I'm not into Red X."

"Then why do we have to keep coming back?" he said in a whine. "I don't like him."

"Nobody likes him. He's a grumpy, old man who just wants some company."

Wally snorted. "Yeah, some my _wife's_ compan—_ow_! What was that for?!"

"I'm not even your fiancee," she snapped. "I haven't said 'yes' to your non-poised question! By the way, why..._haven't _you asked yet?"

"...I gotta think of a spectacularly romantic way to get you in my pants?"

Jinx glowered at him. "I feel sorry for our kids," she growled. "Maybe I should say 'no' on principle, if only to spare them of your idiocy!"

He brightened. "We're going to have kids?"

"No, I just brought up children for the sake of having sex—_yes_, I want kids!"

"And I'm going to give them to you," he said knowingly as his grin widened. "So, how many do you want? I was thinking maybe—"

"Don't talk to me, don't look at me, don't even come near me."

"You did ask."

"And I wish I hadn't." Her relief was evident. "We're here."

Wally visibly drooped. "...I could have carried you here. We could've gotten here a lot faster."

"What, and drop in with you brutishly having me in your arms? No, thanks. Honestly, West, you're ridiculous sometimes. Do you want me to fulfill your masochistic fantasy of having the opportunity to beat the crap out of a gimp? Let me guess, you want me to say, 'I've having a hot, torrid affair with Red X all this time and I'm coming back for more...?'"

"_Anytime_,babe." Red X wheeled into view. His voice was husky as he added, "So, you wanna sex me up right now? Or did you bring the guy here to have a threesome? _Nice._"

With his eyes narrowed, Wally's glare was inflamed. "...Red X."

"Kid," he replied affably. "It's nice seeing you out of that outfit for once. Do you know what it looks like when we have the Flash running in and out of my side of town?"

"The day you slip up, X, I'll be—"

Jinx dragged him into a chair. "Enough of your macho antics," she said, irate, and then turned. "This isn't a social call, Red. We're acting on an unofficial inquiry for the Titans, so you can put your toys away."

The fact that she told him immediately why they were was a gesture of trust. His shoulders ease up a bit. "Oh, good." Red X flung his knives to the side, shrugging. "I thought I'd have to break out some serious moves to get you guys to leave. Nice to know I won't be targeted even if _I'm a cripple_."

Rolling his eyes, Wally crossed his arms and jerked his head away. "Fine. It wasn't like I really was going to attack you or anything."

"Of course not. We're all friends here, aren't we?" Red X smirked and rolled past them. "Jinx, dear, does your boy drink outside of a sippee cup?"

"Don't bother," she snapped. "We just got out of a restaurant."

"Maybe you should have something yourself. You seem stressed. Take your pick, gossip or news? That's all anybody wants from me nowadays."

"I guess business hasn't been hot lately, huh?"

"You have no idea. So, what's it going to be?"

"Tell me how Gizmo's been doing," Jinx said suddenly.

"Ah." Red X leaned back, sounding unsurprised. "I see how it is. A little bit of gossip mixed with a little bit of news. Well, don't take my news straight up because the media's full of it. Our boy Gizmo's been damn busy and I've personally delivered some stuff to him recently. Nothing too obvious, but he's still in some deep illegal shit. It's a blast following him around."

Gazing determinedly away, Wally looked like he really didn't want to be there, but Jinx fell quiet. "You've...you've seen him, have you?"

"Word is he's filched some tech from S.T.A.R.S. and had a creative license moment when he brought it in to be distributed among the masses, all after he'd given the weapons his own twist. I gotta say, though, it's pretty nasty stuff and I wouldn't want to get on that kid's bad side."

"...Thanks, X," she said slowly.

"Don't mention it, but don't forget to forget all about the gimp who tipped you off, though. I don't want my name anywhere near those damn paparazzi."

"Why are you helping us?" Wally asked finally. "This is the third time we've gone to you, and you're being very—obliging. Your info, they all check out, so I have to wonder..."

"Of course they check out. It's the business that I run on the side and I don't do things half-assed. As for why am I helping you? I'd have thought Jinx would've told you that by now. Make you more...receptive towards my help and all."

Red X smirked, taking his time in getting comfortable in his chair. "I'm not doing this out of the goodness of my own heart, kid. I'm in it for myself. Gizmo doesn't do business with our ring alone. The guy is aggressive and active as hell, which makes him an ideal candidate, but he's such a finicky customer he'll never stay with one group for a long time. My goal is to sabotage the other syndicates so that Gizmo will come to _us_. It's a grand plan, a bit of a stretch, even, with all the drama that's sure to come out, but money's money. Gotta make a living somehow, right?"

"Sometimes..." Wally shook his head, sounding exasperated. "Sometimes, I don't know what to do with you, big guy."

"Just know that I'm not a threat to your precious city. I'm only here to make dough. I'm sure your little wifey can tell you that."

"You heard that?!"

"And much, much more. So," the cripple jeered, "you guys want kids, huh. Well, good luck to you, folks, because I'll never have any."

"Too bad," Wally snorted. "I would've had them call them call you Daddy X, like that ridiculous Ding Dong Daddy O name."

"Children," Red X sneered. "I'll never have them. Ever. And I'm not going to start anytime soon."

Jinx smirked, amused. "That's what they all say, buddy. You just wait. You'll get your just deserts, and I'll be laughing when you do."

A plaintive tug at his shirt and Red X jerked awake. His mask was off and, for one panicked moment, he groped around for it only to stop.

His mask was held up for him. Lips twisted wry, he took it gently from his ward and placed it on his face. He sighed and it was a relieved, mechanical sound. "You know...you're not too bad yourself."

The young boy cocked his head, blinking.

"Yeah, yeah," Red X grumbled. "You're lucky I like Jinx as much as I do or I would've chucked you out onto the streets myself. The things I do for that girl sometimes..."

Pitter-patter feet followed him eagerly as he wheeled around the counter, but then he shook his head. "Stay back there," he commanded.

A slight droop in posture.

"No. I'm not letting anyone get a whiff of you here. Bad shit will go down if you're seen. I bet you didn't know that, huh?"

The kid's expression was still pathetic, but he wasn't giving in. "Fine! You're small. You can hide under that table and no one would be the wiser. Hell, you're quiet enough already. Go! Someone's coming."

He wasn't giving in. Of course he wasn't. Red X didn't _do_ wimpy. He was hardcore. He kicked ass. He could run circles around his competitors and he dodged slippery deals with ease. There wasn't a dealer alive who didn't know his name, and he intended to keep it that way. He was established. He was famed. He was most definitely _not _fluffy and sweet.

Not even when he was awarded an equally big and fluffy grin.

Damn it.

Satisfied when the kid was hidden, he turned to face the front when he balked. Growing, he rolled forward with a glower. "I thought I told you not to come yet, kid! That was the agreement with—"

"Sorry," the man interrupted tersely, stepping into the light, "but I don't _do _orders, Red X."

xx

"West is dead."

"And?"

"I...I came here. I didn't—I didn't know what to do! It's all..."

"Shut up and sit down. For fuck's sake, you're crying all over the merchandise."

Jinx sat miserably down and didn't look at him at all. Feeling older than he should've, he muttered, "Look. Kiddo. Look at me."

She mumbled something, but he couldn't hear her. He wouldn't have wanted to, either. Red X didn't care much for her self-pitying, and Jinx was just...pathetic. Goddamn it, she was a mess. It was like she became a street urchin that got run over twice, had a nice faceful of mud, and at the end of her journey was finally spat upon and kicked in the gut. It fucking hurt to even look at her.

This was not the protegee he trained.

"Fine. Don't look at me. Serves you right for mucking along like you do. What is this? I'm the first person you go to? _I_ am? Not your Titans, your good guys, or anything? Why don't we first start by you telling me why you sought comfort in a cripple? A cripple that doesn't give a damn, by the way." But something like regret stung his throat, making his voice raspier than usual. They both knew he was lying. It was why she looked up.

"It's...it's been three weeks since I left and...it's taken me—taken me..."

"Stop sobbing. When you cry like that, your makeup runs all over the place." Sounding as steely as possible, he added, "So he's dead. Big fucking catastrophe, but you're here, aren't you? You're _alive_ and you are not going to break from this thing. You want to know why?"

She curled into herself, eyes tightly shut. "...No. Don't say it! Don't—"

"It's because you're a villain, Jinx," he spat. "And villains _don't _break, not when they started off skewed from the beginning. Want to know why it hurts so much right now? Because you had friends coddling you, good guys who wanted damn teatimes and heart-to-hearts. You're stronger than this. You're not going to break, you hear? You're going to come out of this colder, stronger, _harder_ before you go off and get yourself killed. You're not going to break."

"H-how? What am I going to do?!"

"You're not going to do anything," he snapped. "Just sit tight because we are going to talk. We'll dredge up every last memory of your boy toy and we are going to _talk_."

"And then?" she whispered.

Red X sneered and his voice came out a little gruff. "And then you're going to stay here because I'm not letting any shitty Titan tear into you right now. You came to _me_, right? Not them. You're going to hate me. You're going to want to fuck me five ways over by the time I'm done with you, but you're going to have gotten exactly what you needed." He looked at her sharply. "I'm not going to coddle you. We're going to work through this little episode of yours together and, come ten years, you're going to thank me. The moment you want to bawl like some hero and have a pity-party, you leave."

"I—I don't know what to do..." She slapped hands over her mouth and retched dryly into them, feeling overwhelmed and sick. Her eyes, wide and unseeing, had pupils shrunken to mere pinpricks. "I don't know what to do. I don't know what do."

"You can start by getting out of those filthy clothes and taking a shower, kid."

Her smile was hallow. "Thanks..."

xx

Music. It was the first thing that greeted him when he passed over the threshold. He heard gentle, harmonious music, alien in the disastrous disarray of his surroundings. It wasn't even a building! It was...a cave?

Weird. He was in an opened-mouthed cave that served as an electronics shop? But the walls were thick and mottled with wires, panels, and erratically blinking lights. The music seemed to give the coated walls, ceiling, and floors a life of their own, and he swore the thick and thin wires and cords ran together into one pulsing stream of data. He could literally see them pulsate!

Kid Flash, bemused and not a little wary, took care not to step on anything.

There was a quiet chuckle and he spun around, only to be held in the gazes of two blonds. A female and a male. A threat—?

"Don't get your knickers in a twist, Kid Flash," the lanky-haired female murmured, but he noticed that her smile had dropped. "You don't have to attack us."

The music had stopped. The male blond looked intently at Kid Flash before resuming his strumming, but not before giving a curt gesture to the woman. She tilted her head, brows raising high on her forehead, and then turned back to him. "We're the proprietors of this shop. What can we do you for?"

Kid Flash immediately started. "I found you guys because I need a laptop." He remembered how irritated Jinx was when he came back without any tech. "Something small and fast. Maybe a palmer. Do you have any of those for sale?" Of course they did, but he knew not to push his luck—these guys were legendary. He went through god only knew how many meals on the run trying to catch up to the duo as fast as he could and he even rung up some tech guy Cyborg knew to locate them.

"It's funny," she answered finally. "I hear there's been some activity up north. In Jump. A certain Titan is rounding them up...?"

He knew what she wanted, but would it be enough? "Cyborg. He's on commission from the top, and I'm helping."

"So I hear," was her lofty reply.

Struggling not to fidget in the subsequent silence, his eyes flicked all over the place and he couldn't help but be taken in by the man in the corner. "That...that's beautiful music. I didn't know anybody could still play. The guitar, I mean."

The musician stopped instantly, eying the boy hard. Kid Flash wondered what he said wrong.

"Forgive him," the woman drawled, stepping forwards, "but he's mute. Has been long, long, long before the Catalyst." She paused, easily understanding the rapid signals sent her way. "...And he says it's not a guitar. It's a lyre. 'Get it right.'"

Kid Flash flushed; he hardly knew what every musical instrument looked like! But he kept any retort down. He would've hit a whole new low if he started a fight with a mute or a woman. "And the computer?"

"Hm? Oh, yes, the laptop. Right. We don't have one."

"What do you mean you don't—" He broke off, annoyed, when the woman turned away from him; the mute was talking again. He waited impatiently for her to look at him, but he only got glances for his troubles.

"Ah, really—?"

"No, no, that's—"

"...Um, no, definitely not."

"Why? _Why_? Because it's Cyborg! Don't tell me you _want _to help him—?"

"Oh. Wait, but shouldn't you...?"

"I see."

It was like she was having a deranged argument by herself; he couldn't make head or tails of the one-way conversation. But he did understand one thing.

"Why won't you guys help me? Is it because of _Cyborg_?" He couldn't help it; he was growing angry. "Cyborg did nothing wrong! He's going to take Mikron down and you have an obligation to—"

She burst out laughing. The mute looked sullen.

Kid Flash was put out. He wondered what was so freakin' _hilarious_ about what he just said.

The question was soon answered. She tossed lanky bangs out of her face and suddenly spat, "It's because the bastard did _that_ to Joe!"

"...Cyborg made him mute?"

Said mute's face darkened and he abruptly stood, to the woman's astonishment. "Wait, Joe, I'll take care of the brat! You don't have to—"

His held up hand stopped her, and something tightened in her face. "Joe...Joe, don't do this. Don't—!" But the woman was flung backwards by some unseen force and her snarl was the last expression Kid Flash saw on her face before it became utterly blank.

She toppled towards the ground, as if she had puppet strings cut, but before he could properly panic, the woman jerked onto her feet without ever hitting the floor.

"...I...m-must." The strangled voice rang with remorse. "I am...sorry."

There was something—off about her. Before, Kid Flash could easily spot the fluid transitions of change on the woman's face, but now she...she was so...

Urged on by some some instinct or another, he turned to look at the mute only to see that his body was crumpled, lyre hanging from a limp grip. Horrified, he turned back to the woman, seeing 'her' in a whole new light.

"You're him," he called immediately, wildly. "The one who betrayed the Titans—!"

Something glowed in her eyes then, a sort of unnatural neon hue, and Kid Flash knew the possession was complete. The woman hadn't even fought! And now—would the traitor go after him next? What would he do? What would happen? Would he possess him to go back to—kill—Cyborg? He may not have completely liked the guy, but he was still _Cyborg, _his friend, his teacher, his parent—

_I never thought of anyone but Wally as my parent before_!

The woman stepped forward heavily, jerkily, but Kid Flash was no longer seeing her anymore. Instead, he was seeing—_Wally_!

Eyes warm, the Flash smiled at his ward. "I'm proud of you, Bart. You really stepped up."

Expression sulky and voice sullen, Bart replied, "Some challenge. It was stupid. When can I help you? I'm sick of staying home. I want to join the Teen Titans!"

Wally sounded rueful. "We talked about this before."

Something broke through that childish anger, and his words came out more desperate, faster. "I can fight! I'm not a little kid anymore! I...I—my birthday! I just had my birthday and I'm a teen now!"

A slight lift to his lips, far from mocking, but to the young boy's stubborn eyes he was being laughed at. "A preteen, Bart. You turned ten last week."

"Why won't you let me fight alongside with you? You know I can hold my own. You trained me for this!" Quieter, now. "I...I can fight. I can be Kid Flash."

"But can you bear it? I know you can handle the job," Wally added, "but that's not the point here."

"Then tell me how...tell me how I can become better! Stronger. I want to fight!"

"It's not all about fighting. It's whether you can still keep going even," a soft smile now, "even when the world is after you. The public is so fickle, Bart. They'll praise you one day and then turn you out the next. You do one thing wrong, and they'll eat you alive for it. Or, you can be the worst person in the world and turn into a completely different person, but they still wouldn't care. It's that effort, that sacrifice, you have to be willing to give...but..."

Something about Wally's tone made Bart stop short. "But?" he whispered.

"I don't think you're ready to understand how dark this world can be."

* * *

The woman isn't an OC and Jericho isn't really a traitor. What I do is take crucial stuff from the comics, but don't follow canon completely through because this isn't the real future—this is Starfire's proposed future. Hah, justification.

I'm slowly building onto the Red X/Jinx friendship, but more to come because some things don't make sense, like Wally's somewhat easy tolerance towards said friendship. And Red X is temporarily hiding a kid for Jinx's sake, present time. Yeah, I guess the kid's important, but the shop visitor is even more so. They're not OCs, either.


	11. G'V: Solace

This update's a barrage of spoilers in one convoluted mix of introspective, flashbacks, show quoting, constant timeskipping, and tone flipflopping. Not my best work, but it was fun, and the identity of Jericho's partner is revealed, so Jinx finally steps down from her little limelight spree.

Gizmo ended up here, too. That should be fun.

* * *

She was a rough and tough mechanic. She would even call herself an engineer if she was feeling flattered enough. In truth, though, she was neither, having only picked up a bit of her expertise here and there and called it her own. But concentrating hard on her work, she would sometimes forget to eat or sleep. There was something about pulling things apart and putting them back together so precisely and manipulating all those tools and gadgets...

She supposed she got that obsessive quality from her late master.

High school was dull and drab, but she tolerated it; the real winner was really what happened after high school. A university. College. Sure, they weren't what she wanted when she was a rambunctious, crazy kid, but she got older. Wiser. She learned that knowledge was power and to have it was everything.

She also got that from her late master. He was a bastard who liked to talk a lot, but at least he knew what he was talking _about_. She never felt stupid from the stuff she got off of him, and she still used the skills she'd snagged to this day.

All in all, though, she'd been a fairly normal kid. Nothing too spectacular and nothing too ordinary. Mediocre...? She could blend into any crowd, but her personality demanded she didn't. She didn't want to sink into the background like some wallflower. No, she wanted to be out there and livin' it up. She wanted to have some fun in her life, not wither away like some forgotten old, curtain.

She felt a little down for awhile, but she got back up, brushed herself off, and moved on. Disappointment and rejection and self-loathing and angst and crap and shit—they weren't for her. So what if the world punched her around a little? She would punch right back. That didn't mean she was some snotty bitch or anything, but that did mean she was hardened, jaded, and prone to acerbic criticism. After all, things changed.

So, okay, she had some issues. Whatever. At least she didn't wallow. She _hated_ self-pity. She couldn't stand it at all.

Maybe that was why she started to kick around Joseph in the beginning. It wasn't like she meant to get mad at him, honest, but sometimes he was so...!

The guy lost his girlfriend, though, his sweet backbone-for-a-future-wife kind of gal. He went noodles after she went dearly beloved on him, and then he moped like a wimp.

She...may have been slightly insensitive to him during those days. Just a little. She couldn't really emphasize, though; she'd never lost anyone dear to her before—

Except for that other one little dude who she kicked around a bit, maybe even more so than Joseph. He looked like a lost little boy after her abject rejection.

Served him right. She wasn't going to live in the past—the future was what was important! She wasn't going to wallow. She never wallowed.

Sometimes, she felt kinda bad. Sort of like when Joseph turned those big, round, plaintive eyes on her. Honestly. Did she have a soft spot for wimpy men or something?

She didn't feel attracted to him in any way. Hell, she hadn't even liked him at first. Surely, the feelings were mutual? There was their pasts to consider. He was connected and she was connected, ergo, they were connected to each other. Indirectly, times two. How did they tolerate each other back then?

Well, it didn't matter now. They were stuck together and she wasn't about to let the guy out of her sight. Sometimes, he was just like a kid, and that gentle countenance of his would be marred by his pretty blood if she let him out into the world alone. She had to protect him. She had to because who else would? She had others to protect, too, once upon a time, but they were gone. And he was here. She wouldn't fail this time. She would succeed.

In some bizarre way, he was her friend, responsibility, counselor, and musician all in one. He was her musician because he never played for anybody else. It was her comfort, her balm. When she got too out of control, he would whip it out and start strumming. When the dreams became too much, he'd awaken her with a bang. And when the hallucinations got to her...oh, god, the hallucinations—!

He'd slap her. She'd snap out of it. They'd sit. He'd talk. She would eventually talk, too.

"I'm afraid."

A low, warm buzz in the back of her mind lilted in response. She smiled, but she was still hesitating.

"Something will go wrong. It always does. Cyborg...he screwed you up! I don't know if—if I can undo his work. I'm...you've been trapped for so long and I want to do this for you! I really, really do."

The computer chip in front of her glinted in the light, the surrounding metallic disk giving off the impression of swirling serenity. She could feel his stare.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I found you on chance...I never expected a human being to be stuck in a stupid CD! And...and no matter how many times I feel you in my head, you can't tell me nothing will go wrong!" Teeth biting down on her lip so hard she bled, her hands clenched the edge of the counter until they were white. She thrust her head forward and yelled, "What happens if I mess up your new body?!"

Warmth blanketed her and she suddenly felt calm. Blinking, she muttered, "You have that much confidence in me, huh? Fine...show me what you really look like."

Her body snapped still and she felt a shudder deep within her. For one moment, she almost gave into blind panic when that same firm clasp grasped her mind and eased into her being. That...feeling seeped to all of her extremities and left her in a numb sort of blissful state, and she wondered if this was how it really felt to be possessed by a ghost because it didn't feel bad in anyway. She should've been itching to boot the spirit out of her, but she didn't because it was such a curious sensation and she wondered why most people screeched when they encountered paranormal activity—

Her eyes flung open, but she could no longer see. Blackness, inky and blank, surrounded her, but she wasn't afraid. She'd been warned.

Something popped up in front of her. A flat image, two dimensional, but large and scratchy and faded. A memory, then.

She stepped forward, and the movie started. Slides of his life flashed by her, but her mind processed them faster than she could see or take note. It was a charging soundless train whooshing past her, unseen winds whipping past her and flinging her hair up into the sky...

It finally clicked into place like the trigger of a gun, obscenely loud in this silence, and she could finally stare up at her leisure...and was amazed.

She stepped forwards and reached an awkward, outstretched hand to the screen and touched the face she saw. Some irrational feeling of wonderment was raising its ugly head and she felt crashing nostalgia fall all around her and she couldn't even breathe—!

"You never told me you looked like your father."

The image wavered, alarmed.

"Yes..." she murmured, palms and cheek pressed up against the screen. "I knew your father so very well."

Static slowly crept across Jericho's face, and then the still picture suddenly moved. The boy within stared down at her, worried. She didn't even notice, so lost in her own fantasies.

Abruptly, her face twisted into a sharp grin, teeth bared, and eyes wide. "My master taught me all I knew and he's always there! Always watching. Always, always..." She let out sob and slid down the screen, crying, "Where is my papa?! My god, my everything? Why has he forsaken me—wretches of Titans! _I'll kill them_...!"

The image went blank, immediately before hands clasped at her arms, dragging her away.

She panicked. "No! _No_...! He's gone—_мой бог, мой бог_! Oтец, наставник, владелец! He's—_DEAD_!"

Hysterical screaming and gnashing teeth as she struggled, the figure behind her slumped and fell _into_ her and she jerked upwards, eyes wild and desperate. "Get—out—of—_me_!! Slade—Slade, _help_...!"

_You promised to fight by my side forever. _

Her grin was insane, eyes twitching and bloodshot—her mouth opened in a silent cry.

_And that's a promise I intend to make you keep. _

"_Fräulein_, _fräulein_," her lips murmured. "Why do you scream?"

The woman groggily sat up and yawned, squinting into the darkness. It was early dawn. "Sorry...Joe. How's your new body coming along?"

The mute tested a stiff elbow and then nodded slowly, metal head gleaming.

"D-Did," she yawned again, "I fall asleep again? I didn't mean to. Here, I'll get some casing for you...all those wires look like your entrails or something."

He frowned, then motioned her head. His fingers twitched as if wanting to form into something, but they weren't mobile yet. She looked apologetic.

"I know you speak sign language, but I haven't gotten the joint parts strung in yet and I don't want you to be doing anything with your legs—don't stand up! You'll fall over into pieces and then I'll have to start all over."

Joseph fell back into his seat, appearing distinctly disgruntled.

"Yeah, yeah. This is just the prototype, but soon you'll be able to move around and stuff. After we get some flesh components on you, you'll be able to walk outside freely without anyone making off with your parts. Wouldn't want that to happen, d'ya?"

He shook his head, motioning her head again. She was starting to get a little annoyed. "Yeah, so what if I keep dreaming? It's _over_. I'm not about to go insane again." She sliced the air with a hand. "Slade's gone, big deal. I know what you look like so we don't have to go through that crap all over again. Why do you have to keep bringing it up?"

He stared at her, then fell back into his seat. His eyes were blank and there was a glimmer of activity there, but she rolled her eyes when she felt his presence in her head. "Would you stop it? I pretty much know what you want to say even if you're not the most eloquent person right now. _No_, I don't want to lend you my vocal cords. Everything you want to say will have to be done through partial-possession. I'm not feeling gracious, if you catch my drift."

She winced, pressing a hand up to her temple. "All right, all right, I won't boot you out. I hate it when you do this. Because of a little voice in my head, I'm walking around with a splitting headache. Make it quick, Joe, I really want to get you finished."

Walking over to his mechanical host, she nodded. "Uhuh, yeah..." She peered into the chest cavity where a computer disk was happily glowing away, and she reached inside and ruffled through some of the connecting cords. Irate, she added, "It's not like I can download stuff _into you_. You're not an actual frigging machine! Honestly, you're off your rocker if you think I can do what you're asking me to do. Do you want to play that badly?"

Something clicked. Satisfied, she pulled away and jeered, "Ha! There, now you can do yourself a favor and get back into your body. I've just adjusted the neural system so that you can—yes, yes, you can _play_ now. Ugh...sorry, but could you look at me for a sec?"

The body jerkily sat up and gazed at her. Startled, she exclaimed, "You should've told me! Stupid eyeballs...do you really need them? Crud is starting to form around them, so no wonder you keep tripping. I really don't feel like grave robbing or making synthetics, but I don't want you to be half-inside my head and half-inside this thing..."

Her smile was wry and tired. "Quite the predicament we have here. Sometimes, I don't even know what you'd do without me, Joe."

The voice in her head said nothing, and the body didn't move.

xx

How they met was something she didn't like dwelling on. She hadn't even known the bastard had a son and, voila, there was his kid. Lying low and ducking beneath the Teen Titans' notice was easy enough, but she'd been so sick of everything. And then Beast Boy showed up. Pretentious, annoying little bug. He made her nostalgic for things gone and ashamed by past sins, but she still...

High school was never in her plan. She couldn't even complain about boy troubles—her father was dead. Both of them. The one that died back there on the frozen, bloody snow of Markovia...and the one that molded her to become a killer.

She tried, she really did, but she couldn't settle down in a normal life. Half of the time, she'd been looking over her shoulder, expecting to see some superhero or another flying over her shoulder. And sometimes she'd see a store and memories would hit her right there. School was safe, boring, but safe. Security. Steady. It was steady and would never hurt her.

When she was a little girl, foreign, dazed, and confused, she fled the cities of this country and ran off into the wild. Alone. Lonely. She had no home. The earth was her home. She needed no home.

That was what she tried to tell herself. She'd long given up on proper schooling and finding a life in a nice, small town somewhere. She wasn't a homemaker. She wasn't a civilian. She wasn't even a superhero.

But she tried. God, she tried.

After she was found out in that school of hers by Beast Boy, she knew it would be the last time she'd ever try. No more wishing. No more longing. It ended _there_. She had enough.

But by the time the Catalyst came, she'd been completely unprepared.

She blew smoke into the man's face and smiled. "So, what's the catch? I'm all up for blowing things up, but I've never done anything fancy like this before."

The middleman appeared stoic as ever, but she caught that minute twitch. He hadn't appreciated the foul smell. "The only catch is the possibility of encountering metahuman resistance. Can you handle it?"

Flicking burning, warm-hued ash at him, she drawled, "Of course I can handle them. I just get in and out, right? Do yourself a favor and get your employer to watch the night sky." She grounded the cancer-stick beneath her boot, and smirked. "It's gonna be a hot time in a cold town tonight."

"Good. We part at the city."

"But before that we celebrate," her smirk widened, "with fireworks."

She delivered as good as she got. They did the exchange after she blew close to an entire district to flames, and then they parted ways. Easy. Simple. The job had been fun. She hadn't been to Steel City before. It'd been great sightseeing. She hadn't even cared about what she'd done.

She had done horrible things. Those few years during the Catalyst were...Stupid—stupid, stupid, stupid! How had she fallen in the wrong crowd again? Maybe she was bitter. Or maybe she was just stupid. It certainly would explain a lot of things.

She was shaking. She didn't want to admit it, but she was shaking. "What do you mean _Mikron's dead_? How the fuck did he die?!"

Her fellow bomber shook his head. "Look, Terra—"

"It's not Terra," she shrieked. "Call me by my name—Markov! _Markov_. What the hell are we supposed to do without him? He caused that goddamn explosion! He was the one with all the plans!"

He started to back away. "Markov, it's over. We're done for!"

She gritted her teeth and barged past him, shoving him to the ground. "We are not done until Mikron _says_ we're done! Phase three has only just begun!"

"But—but the guy's dead..."

"Our leader knew what he was doing! He cannot die! _Damn it._" Terra let a fist fly into the wall as she seethed. "If those goddamn laws are passed, we'll be eradicated! The president of the godfucking United States will round us up and _kill us off_. So don't say Mikron's dead, y'hear?!"

"He did leave plans," the terrorist whispered. "He did...Markov, he did leave plans."

Whirling around, she spat, "Why didn't you say so earlier? Which one was it?!"

"Catalyst! The Catalyst operation! It was the final part of phase three!! No one...n-no one has the nerve to carry it out! That's why," he desperately said, scrambling away from her. "That's why! Markov—oh, god—_Markov_...!"

There was a rumble around the underground base and nearly all of the lights shattered at once. Her face, grinning wide and cracked, was accentuated with sharp shadows. "What's the matter, _big boy_." She crouched in front of him, tossing a rock up and down, and it glimmered in the light. "You don't have the balls to carry it out? Our leader's great work? _When he's dead_?"

"D-don't kill me...Markov—I'll do it..._I'LL DO IT_!"

Her eyes were inscrutable as they gazed on him and then she scoffed, standing. Despite the change in attitude, the sudden terrifying, seizing horror that had clenched him wasn't gone. "Whatever. You don't have the guts, but then...you're just a civilian playing at terrorism." She half-turned, and her profile was hit harshly with light, the only clear sight in the dark room. Her eye swiveled to her peripheral view in order to look down at him. "As Mikron was a fellow metahuman, his allies must be as well and, frankly," that same eye narrowed, "you've never been one of us. You're just a big, fat _rat_."

"No...no," the man whimpered, crawling away on his hands and back and feet. "_No_!"

"Thanks, teach, for the crash course on the mechanics bomb-building, but..." another toss of the rock, "I was never like you. I don't need technology to blow things up." Another toss, another catch—she paused. "Seeya. It's been a blast. Really."

She pulled back her arm and heaved the rock forward. The man winced, cowering at the action, but when nothing happened he peeked from his arms and blanched. The rock was cracking and trembling violently _right by the man's head_ and he let out a shriek, but she only smiled before ripping a hole in the floor with her powers and disappearing down into the depths.

Darkness swallowed her long before the man could try and crawl after. And not a moment later, the whole base exploded into smithereens. The man died instantly, but painfully.

Blood was obliterated even before it could splatter.

_My name is Terra. And I have done horrible things_.

Although that time she hadn't sworn herself to some dark master—Mikron was anything but dark and he wasn't interested in keeping slaves. He hated the lot of them, always scowled, too. He hated her. She hated him. As far as their relationship went, everything was mutual. Even respect. But those moments were far in between.

"Where is that pink-haired woman of yours?"

"Shut it, bitch, Jinx ain't mine."

"The one who double-crossed this side and back? Where did she go this time?"

Mikron snorted, eying the contents of a vial carefully. "Hell if I know. Not my prob," he spat, tossing the container over his shoulder. "It was getting too hot for her. She up and left the last month. Where're you when all the drama was happening?"

"Steel City. It was short, sweet, and simple, but the pay was good and the prepping up wasn't bad. Got some new techniques for my troubles." Terra flopped into a seat, giving a sigh. "Some guy high up wasn't liking the way things were looking in Steel, so he had me turn on the heat for the Titans."

"Titans East," he corrected, sneering. "The real Titans are practically out of a job. Have you seen Jump lately?!"

"Yeah," she said flatly. "A warzone. Good job there, Gizmo, just when I was looking forward to taking over the city again."

"It's Mikron, bitch! And shut up about Jump—I wasn't the one who smashed it!"

"At least Cyborg's still around," Terra said lightly. "Looks like you failed to smash _him_ into pieces. Whoops, I'm sorry, but he's in hiding, isn't he? Doesn't it just piss you off to know that somewhere out there the Titans could be regrouping?" She failed to mention it was what they did to _her_ once; she didn't like thinking about Slade.

Mikron was muttering now. "Fuckin' tin can man can't mess with _anyone_ now. The Catalyst's started! No one can stop it."

"Now that," she drawled, "I can agree with you on. Too bad we don't have that hacker chick here anymore. She made the first phase a snap. Economy's way down thanks to her."

"Jinx is replaceable," he sneered. "Same with you, Markov."

"Really. And what about when the third part of the plan comes into play? If you off me now, I bet your ass you're gonna wish you hadn't killed me off. 'Oh, geez, we could've used the Russian who controlled _earth_,' am I right?"

"Don't get cocky! If you die before I tell you to die, I'll use other means. I don't _need_ you, Markov."

"Xenothium," she said carefully, "is hardly a stable matter, even now."

"But that bastard down the highway to Steel knows how to use it effectively."

Annoyed at the reference, Terra snorted. "Please. The cripple? The guy just smuggles crap."

"Ha! You went and got offed in some volcano, so you don't know about Red X! The guy's a fuckin' genius when it comes to Xenothium."

"My, my, what's this? Mikron praising another for his ingenuity? Surprise, surprise."

"Cram it, Markov!" he snapped. "X is good at what he does and at least he's known for being _Red X_! Not like you."

"Don't say it."

He cackled. "I mean, fuck it, you've slept with _Slade_! And the Titans? You're shitting me when you said they wanted you back. You're helping _me_!"

Terra sneered. "At least with you, my talents are going somewhere. I want to stop the freaks on top who think they can pull a genocide out of their asses and be done with us. With all of you, I'll get some _respect_. I can be somebody."

Mikron's smirk was pronounced. "And there's nothin' stupid superheroes can do to stop us. They can protect the civs all they want—we're in it for the metahumans they've already killed."

"The deaths they've blamed on us." Terra's smile was bitter. "We'll make up for the felonies we've apparently caused twice over."

And that was that. It wasn't like she meant to...to shack up to some future urban legend or anything. She did what she did to survive. She wasn't unhinged—not at all. There wasn't something screwy wrong with her, but sometimes...sometimes, she...

So, fine, she'd been taken aback by Joe's identity. No biggie, no _prob_. She knew who she was. She wasn't about to go ballistic over psychoanalyzing herself. She wasn't going to lose control!

_Now, Terra, how can you lose something you never had?_

She blinked, and her stance was wary. "What the..."

Titans Tower was in shambles, naturally, and abandoned, but she already knew that. It was what was inside that interested her. She was a scavenger and spare parts sold high these days, and she knew the T-Tower had a treasure load of stuff. She needed the money. She needed to survive.

She needed some closure. With herself? With the Titans? She didn't even know anymore. The Catalyst—it had...

They were all such fools. Stupid, brainless fools—but she had little regrets. She wasn't losing sleep at night, and she wasn't about to fall over in tears about it. It was done. It was _over_. They had failed. Everything was fucked up now, and they had failed.

She was good at failing.

Bringing a glowing hand up to her face, she clenched it and a rock came flying towards her, morphing along the way. By the time she snatched it from the air, it had already formed into a crowbar. She rammed it into the side of a panel and tore the metal free. White, hot-lacing electricity could literally be seen spiking from inside the box, but Terra ignored it, gritting her teeth and jumping back only when the plate was completely free.

She crouched in a lunge pose, one hand steadying her on the ground and the other pulled back, hissing yellow. The sparks of light from the box poured out of the opening, reaching, grabbing, with spindly, arching spikes. They clasped at the room, clasped at her, but Terra only stood ready. The smoke dissipated and the miniature lightening died down along with it.

She waited, then slowly eased to her feet. Twirling the crowbar to the floor, it shattered upon contact into hard, compact shards. It no longer looked extraordinary except for the fact that the pieces sparkled and glimmered like precious stones, but she was already moving forward.

"Well, now," she murmured, encasing her hand and arm in a thin layer of gleaming rock. "What do we have here?"

The freed electricity, which had been so rambunctious before, flared weakly at her, to no effect. She reached in and, for her efforts, pried a computer disk free.

Eyes glowing, pebbles and particles came together to enclose the CD, and she tucked the prize in her pocket, wondering why it seemed so _alive_. Her impromptu armor fell away like dust, but she didn't notice. Uneasy at the sudden stagnant quality of the room, Terra scampered over the rubble and flung herself out the window.

Some time later, she was back at her underground home. Irritated at the enigma she'd stolen, she held the disk up to the light and murmured, "What _are_ you?"

She shouldn't have asked. Letting out gasp, she tried to fling it to the ground, but the disk was attached to her, electrocuting her, _hurting her_.

"You...fuckin'—_bastard—_!" Terra, thrown clear off the cot, ripped the technology from away from her, but it was too late. Jerking back, she seized her head and screamed, "Get out, get out—_get out of my head_!"

Head wrenched up by some unseen force, her eyes, wide, unseeing, and bloodshot, were tearing. She could—_feel—_the bastard moving through her...taking control, taking control, _taking control_ of her body.

And when the sensation reached her mind, she knew it was game over.

"Never," he screamed as she hit the wall with a groan, "I repeat, **never** trust the Titans. You will fight or you will die! Do not let your guard down. Do not let them see your weakness." He grabbed her throat clear off the floor and held her up, glaring. "And do **not** fight the suit ever...again...

"...my apprentice."

* * *

There are three phases to Gizmo's Catalyst, and Jinx had helped with phase one before she left because she thought it was just mindless violence. You can call Gizmo an anti-hero, but he hadn't been one for the entirety of his career.

At one point, Terra was screaming about fathers/mentors/whatever in Russian. She has issues. Sacrificing herself wasn't something she'd been investing in, emotionally, for as long as she'd been investing in Slade. Therefore, that trauma would be the strongest thing her subconscious would take away from, not her impromptu volcano sacrifice. I took that into consideration, but I still think I did something wrong with her since I never really figured out how Terra ticked.

Next chapter is most likely the conclusion of Terra's/Jericho's first meeting and a throwback to present day where we left off with Bart-Jericho-Terra.


	12. G'V: Through the Grapevine

I'm tired of obscuring the Catalyst, so I sat down and dragged Nightwing in for a semi-confrontational but _very_ informational scene with Red X. But this update only reveals the political aspect of the Catalyst, and I want to play around with the terrorist characters a bit more, which is awfully convenient since that would involve delving into the three-year period of the Catalyst. More future chapters to come, obviously.

**Canon Notes**: Slade ends up destroying Blüdhaven. The circumstances surrounding that are not important, only that it allows Nightwing to be free of his Blüdhaven obligations. The chapter takes place a significant amount of time after the Nightwing comic line, so while Dick's still a cop, I've taken creative license with his role.

Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker is referenced vaguely and justifies Bruce's one moment of OOC; BBeyond changed Batman's attitude towards sidekicks because the Joker ends up screwing Tim Drake over.

* * *

Blüdhaven was the type of town that was full of squealing degenerates Nighwing would have sooner spat upon than thrown in jail.

He threw them in jail.

An economically troubled city, it was largely looked over because of its sprawling, metropolis neighbor, Gotham. But Gotham would've overshadowed anything, really, if one only looked at its statistics on crime. There wasn't a resident alive in Gotham who wasn't prepared for a whole assortment of nasty surprises, having evacuations for nearly everything from rampaging insects to giant robot attacks to Joker gas release. The last one wasn't a happy drill, and Gotham was probably even prepared for the day Batman went bat-shit crazy on all of them.

Screw off, the Dark Knight would say, before BSing the world and going dark. Of course, Batman wouldn't have done that. The man was no coward, Nightwing could easily admit that, but he wondered at times why Bruce even bothered. The old man was still going on strong. He may have been feeble and he may have been training some protegee or another and he may have needed a cane to get on by...but Bruce was still Bruce, and Batman wouldn't hang his cape and cowl so easily. Physically, yeah—Batman was no god and he knew full well he was mortal and made all sorts of crazy plans in preparation for his retirement days—but otherwise...

Gotham was...indescribable. It took awhile, but the city finally bounced back to its good old, crazies-ridden self. Unbelievably, the filthy city made its way out from the Catalyst mostly unscathed. Maybe a little more unhinged, but Gotham locals were already a bit off from the start. It wasn't like a near-global economic disaster would have knocked the city off its foundations—no, of course not because America needed its dumpster, its dirty little secret, and Gotham was _it_.

Blüdhaven had the fortunes to be located close to its sister city that it managed to survive. What a shame. Too bad they were far enough away from the west that the cities couldn't have conveniently offed themselves. It would have saved him a lot of stress.

Nightwing wondered why he even bothered anymore. And then something happened that he'd thought would never happen.

The Batman finally snapped. Every Robin, by then, had been so screwed up by the job that Bruce went crazy about ending everything that was the Dark Knight's legacy—_his_ legacy. Confiscated everybody's suits and went personally after Nightwing's when he didn't show up for the farewell ceremony. Dick stopped the vigilante gig after Bruce snapped up his uniform, but only because he was so sick of Batman and everything Gotham. Batman had made a point that night, but it was a gesture, a warning, and he respected the old man's wishes. He officially gave up the cape and cowl business and never entered Gotham in the capacity of Nightwing. It wasn't like he completely stopped crime fighting—he wouldn't leave the wastrels of Blüdhaven to run free—but the days of costuming were over. He had another way to fight wretches now.

Dick Grayson was a cop. Brow raised high, the former Boy Wonder drawled into the phone, "Now? You want me over right _now_?"

He really, really didn't want to deal with Bruce.

"Come now," the older man demanded in that ultra-cool-I'm-Still-Your-Mentor-You-Punk sort of way, before he hung up.

Dick lifted the ancient, corded phone away from his face and grimaced into it.

Yeah. Sure, Bruce. Pull _the Batman_ card on him. He wanted Grayson all the way up in Gotham? Fine, he would go, but he was going to give as good as he got.

He was going to go as Nightwing. Maybe not physically, but...Bruce may have taken his identity, his one way to lash out against the world, against the criminal filth that populated its cities...but he had not taken Nightwing. He had not taken his pride. His anger.

Dick smiled bitterly as he made his way out of his office, wanting nothing more than to punch a certain old man at the moment, when he was stopped.

The secretary was yawning as she handed the papers over. "Here you go, Commish. Knock yourself out."

He accepted them, unsmiling. "Don't tell me another costumed freak came to town?"

"Nah." Around another yawn, she added, "And nobody's broken out yet, so it's your usual fare now."

"Only scum this time?"

"Yup." She looked bored and tired and she was juggling folders and a cup of coffee. "You look like you're raring for some action. God knows where the hell you get your energy in the morning."

"It's part of the job."

"Right. A nice and comfy desk job for ya. I don't know how you can pull it off."

Looking wry, he said, "Is there anything else you wanted?"

"Yep, that report you commissioned? It should be waiting for you at your desk, but, uh...I'm guessing you didn't see it, huh?"

Cursing, Dick swung back around to enter his office while the secretary only shook her head.

"The Mikron files?" he called out, riffling through the thick packet on his desk. "How long—?"

"Only last night, sir. The activity you've been hoping to see? Yeah, it's all there. Some really weird stuff is happening and..."

"You saw?"

"It's what you pay me to do, sir. You've only yourself to blame for your laziness."

He was muttering as he ripped out a page. "Listen, could you hold fort while I'm gone?"

"You're going somewhere, Commish?"

"Yeah," Dick said grimly, donning a coat. "I'm off to Gotham."

"Godspeed, sir."

Yeah. He was going to need it, too.

xx

He was a cop and though the judicial system was as fucked up as he was, he would still try. He'd swim and struggle and scream against the downpour and at the end of the day he would collapse on his couch and wonder why he cared. A workaholic, nobody understood why the commissioner tried so hard; he didn't have an answer either.

Something was driving him, forcing him to act—_pressuring _him. He couldn't ignore crime; he suspected the sights of it were so deeply ingrained in him that it was all he could do to not notice it. It didn't mean he wasn't disgusted. After all, he'd almost recoiled at the sight of his chosen city before realizing that he had to do something to _help._

So, he'd become a cop. Even as Nightwing, he'd been a cop. He had his bad days here and there with loads of corrupt coworkers, but, hey, he'd clawed his way to the top. In the end, he'd been able to secure himself a position where he could _do_ something more substantial, more long lasting, than just throwing criminals in jail. He was the _commissioner_.

Bruce had good timing after all. Dick didn't feel like tromping through Gotham's sister city as both Nightwing and its police head. Juggling identities aside, he'd invested too much passion in his job. Maybe too much. He needed Nightwing to vent—maybe he did need Nightwing to even make a difference because it wasn't like he _liked _his job...

It didn't mean he didn't take it seriously.

Imagine his surprise when Blüdhaven was destroyed, completely demolished, when he arrived after a rare trip from Gotham. And to learn that it was Slade who destroyed it? Bullshit—well, not quite Slade, not the monster from his youth, but _Deathstroke_ or whatever the guy was going by these days.

The bastard.

If there was one thing Nightwing regretted about being Robin, it was his childish ethics. The boy Robin had grown to hate Slade, so much so that the Teen Titans had worried over his anal retentive, obsessive compulsions about said villain, but he was still a boy. A stupid kid embittered by his origins and sick of being the Batman's sidekick. All this and Dick never ended up killing Slade? After everything the man had ever done against his team? After coercing him into becoming his apprentice, throwing the traitor Terra on them, threatening Raven by being the middleman of some intergalactic rageful demon, and over all being a pain in the ass? Outrageous. Preposterous. Un-fucking-believable.

He blamed his Bat morals. He blamed Bruce for a lot of things.

He even blamed his aging mentor for getting him caught up again in his dealings as _Robin. _Again. He'd put that identity to the side—he had never wanted to see that traffic-light-colored disaster of a suit ever, but there went Bruce and dragged him back to the past.

Jump was gone. The Titans were disbanded...what more did Batman want from him? What would it take for the old man to let him be Dick Grayson—just Dick? Hadn't the man stolen enough years from him? Was the matter so important that he had to get his ass over to Gotham to see what Bruce wanted _now_?

Apparently, it was.

He couldn't stop his team from falling apart. He couldn't stop that godforsaken _anger_ in him. He couldn't even stop Blüdhaven from going up in flames.

Slade—it always went back to Slade. Deathstroke. _Whatever._

"Do something about this," was the first thing Bruce demanded of his protegee. Probably the first in twenty-five years. The suit-confiscation incident didn't count, and Dick no longer adhered to Batman's orders.

Still. This was _Bruce_ talking to him, tired, old, jaded Bruce Wayne—not the Batman.

So, he listened. He regretted, but he still listened.

Batman wasn't completely dead to him, after all.

xx

It was the first time he visited Jump again and it was long after Wally had died. His first glimpse of his old haunt after they'd all disbanded, and it years after the Catalyst had ravaged the city. Illegally dodging past borders and tromping through difficult geography—it had been _extremely _difficult to get into the west coast, but Nightwing had done it. He'd done it to finally allow himself time to grieve.

"C'mon, big guy." A grin that quirked wider. "You're not gonna find me under the ground. No way. When I die, I'm going to get someone to burn me up and scatter my bits on the wind. You know, my ashes?"

"How poignant," Robin had said dryly.

It turned out, Kid Flash had been serious. For hours and hours, Nightwing had tried to locate his grave in vain—damn the earthquake!—only to remember what Wally had said about dying. About how horrible it must be to have been able to run so fast in life you could turn back time, but to settle down as a slowly rotting, decomposing corpse. About how terrible it must be to be nothing more than another body in the ground. About how wrong it was to force that kind of fate on anybody calling himself the Flash.

Wally had been the same. He could run as quick as he liked, but it didn't stop the fact that he was going to die someday. So, he made plans. Long before Robin had ever realized it, Wally West had made plans.

"You're asking me to guard your city? You're going _where_...? Holy—! Man, Robin, why don't you tell me these things?! I could've helped you guys with the Brotherhood...Yeah...well, it's not like I'm with the _Flash _anymore and—you know I work alone these days. I'm not looking to join a team, sorry. Whatever...I'm out."

And these plans, of all things, came to light only through his death. Jump didn't have any answers—that ruin?—but Steel did. The directions had said to come for _Steel City_ and not Jump...but it was a necessary detour.

The man turned to face the front when he balked. Growling, he rolled forward with a glower. "I thought I told you not to come yet, kid! That was the agreement with—"

"Sorry," Nightwing interrupted tersely, stepping into the light, "but I don't _do _orders, Red X."

"It's been twenty fucking years since I've seen you, right?" God, he could never have forgotten that raspy voice. At least the guy had the decency to not have used the X suit for the meeting, but the mask still stayed on. Skull white eyes stared at him back, and Nightwing wondered if the other even had a civilian identity anymore or if he was forever trapped as Red X? "If you wanted to see the _other_ kid, you missed him by years."

"The Catalyst."

"Kid, everybody uses that excuse nowadays—as if an earthquake could stop you. You missed his funeral, which was sad."

Nightwing stared. "You were there?"

"Bird boy, I'm _everywhere_. Remember? You guys kicked Jinx out, but at least you made up with West. The guy was pathetic for awhile."

"We did not kick Jinx out."

"And that's important now," Red X said thinly, "...why?"

"You told me you know how Wally died, so talk. I'm not here for anything else and I don't want anything from you. Just info. Once I've taken part in Blood's degradation, I'm leaving."

"And as I've said," he started, settling back into his wheelchair, "Blood killed the kid. I bet that caught your attention, huh?"

"Why did you choose to reveal this now?"

"Still so stiff. This sounds awfully like an interrogation."

Nightwing leaned in forward very slightly. "This _is_ an interrogation."

Red X barked out a laugh. "Still the same I see. The same Titan we all know and love, but with a badass side to boot? You're just like me, kid, with that cutthroat, Machiavellian mentality. But where's your city now, oh Dark Prince?"

Faster than Red X could have stopped it, Nightwing thrust an erect hand at the man's neck and held it fast before it could hit. "Do not," Nightwing said, voice low, "reference my mentor. We are nothing similar to the likes of you. I'm no one's dark _anything_."

Supremely unimpressed, Red X drawled, "Even to Blüdhaven? Kiddo, it was all over the news. Even I got the scoop easily enough, and we're damn near isolated from the rest of the country over here. Slade Wilson went off for bigger, better things and blew up your town, right? Where is he now, I wonder. Are you still looking for him? Or did your precious father send you over here for something else...like the good little boy you are?"

Nightwing ignored the insult, though he withdrew his hand. "I've commissioned a report on Mikron, ever since he'd first broken away from the H.I.V.E.." Tone steely, he added in a murmur, "But now D.C. is in on the action here...and it's not enough. People are still _dying _and the tech I've tracked are..."

"Ah," Red X said, "and the former resident golden boy is interested in the latest thing. You're not the first to try and get the info out of me and certainly not the last."

"I'm not interested in _Gizmo_ anymore." Eyes hard, he murmured, "He died a long time ago. During the Catalyst, his subordinates fell apart without him to lead them."

"And instead they all went crazy," Red X noted. "Yeah, _that _Mikron's definitely dead, but did you really think his legacy would stay down like a kicked puppy? Mikron's back, but the guy masquerading as him is bastardizing the role. He's not playing it right, so a certain key character is aiming to take him down."

"Jinx."

"Hm, aren't you well informed..."

"I'm not interested in her," Nightwing interrupted. "However way the government wants to use a petty terrorist like _her_ isn't any of my business. I'm here for one thing and one thing only, and there's a reason you haven't given it to me yet. What do you want?"

Even behind that bleach white mask, he could tell Red X was smirking. "You haven't shown me any of your cards, so why should I show any of mine? Scratch that, you already know what I have in spades. Goody, goody info...and a darling message from the late Flash."

Nightwing held himself very still, but his precise control did nothing to keep his voice from being cold. "We both know you're going to tell me anyway, so why should I do anything to benefit you? I have nothing that interests you besides being another pawn in this game you're playing."

"Whatever do you mean."

"_Blood...y_ou were always in it for yourself, weren't you? You've been supplying the new Mikron with the cargo he wants. The raw materials."

"I see," Red X said abruptly, a little coolly. "You've done your homework, have you? Good job. Do you want your gold star along with that? Or do you want to hear what our dead, mutual friend has to say already?"

Nightwing grimaced. "...But much as I hate to say it, you're being blackmailed. Whatever hold Blood has on you, you'd do well to sever it. There's no gain for you here. A little counterproductive, isn't it, to be so willing to work with superheroes when you're one of the backers to Blood's little terrorist spree?"

Now the villain's gaze was a little too speculative. "You..._have _been trained by the best. Best keep those lessons close to heart, kid, because not everything is so cut and dry as that."

"As a cop," Nightwing responded, "I've learned that the simplest explanation is most often the right one. What I can't understand, though, is why..." His lips tightened. "Why is it that you were the one Wally talked to in the end? To think, he came to you when I..."

"Bitter, party of one," he drawled, "your table's ready."

"Funny."

"I don't see you laughing."

"Sorry. But after having to deal with psychopaths on a regular basis, your antics don't amuse me anymore."

"It's the suit, isn't it?" Red X mused aloud. "You've always been sore on the subject. It's not like you're going to go traipsing around as _me _anytime soon."

"Drop it."

"Fine, but what's your deal with the other kid? West was a great guy. Swell, even. Does it bother you that he was so willing to run around with the bad guys?"

"Wally," he corrected, "I had no problems with. You, on the other hand..."

"I still say you're bitter." Red X shrugged. "But I'm tired of this game. I'd been running around Jump for god knows how long and now I'm a cripple in the big city. Titans East doesn't give a damn about me as long as I don't do anything particularly spectacular, even if I am only _on _their border. You've become pretty big yourself, and I'm sure I'm due some credit for putting something in that bird brain of yours."

When the vigilante's eyes narrowed, Red X knew he was right.

"Don't push your luck," Nightwing said abruptly. "I still don't like you."

"That's fine," the man replied. "I still don't like your shitty self either."

"...The plans?"

"Not much of a _plan_." Voice dry, Red X added, "You know the kid. As much as a smartass he was, he didn't think ahead sometimes. But when you're dealing with Blood you gotta stay four steps ahead of the game. He didn't remember that and unsurprisingly paid for it, leaving grieving children behind, I'm sure..."

"Did _you _grieve?"

"I'm not too into the whole grief thing. I was making a name at the time and my hands were full dealing with Jinx."

"Were you," Nightwing started quietly, "the one to convert her back? The only reason the original Mikron had her assistance was because you brought her back into the field, didn't you?"

"My, my. There _is_ a limit to how knowledgeable you can be, and you've just broken it." The light almost humorous tone Red X had adopted dropped immediately. "Get off her back, kiddo. I may be to blame, but she's got nothing with you."

Nightwing said nothing.

Red X continued. "Not too long after she quit the terrorist gig, she rounded up the remnants of H.I.V.E. and Blood went along placidly like sheep. Jinx isn't stupid, though. She prepared to deal with him, but at the moment she has no idea..."

He stilled suddenly. "...Why did Wally die?"

"Now you're catching on. It's not important how he died—it's important _why_. Until you understood that, I wasn't going to give you anything to go on." It was with a relish that Red X leaned back into his chair. "Finally! We're going somewhere, but I'll have to put you on hold. My ward is getting a bit hungry, see."

"What?" Nightwing scowled, irritation twisting his features. "You don't _have _a ward, X."

On cue, a boy stumbled into view, and Red X seemed too smug for his own good. Nightwing only narrowed his eyes, both incredulous and angry. "_Who_, X? Who the hell would entrust a child to _you_?"

"I beg to differ," Red X scoffed, but gently guided the boy from behind the counter. Nightwing managed to catch the kid's expression before the boy ducked beneath Red X's arms and peeked shyly from behind the wheelchair.

Something caught in his throat. Nightwing demanded, "Is that—_Kyd Wykkyd_?"

"Blood may have dealt the killing blow," Red X murmured, "but West didn't die in vain and Kyd Wykkyd just happens to be...the result."

The vigilante was shaking, but his voice did not. "Around fifteen years ago, Jinx caught a virus. Something the Brotherhood had left lying around. Something bad. Are you telling me that this entire time another person was _infected_? The Titans—_we never knew of this_. Why were we not told?"

"Kid, that was in the middle of your falling out with West. Patience was never really your thing, was it? West didn't up and become evil or some snit like that—he was working with the H.I.V.E. Five. He was trying to save Jinx. But I bet it didn't look like that from your side of things, did it?"

When Nightwing didn't say anything, Red X's chuckles were low. "West being all secretive and tagging along with villains on their little adventures...you didn't know what to think. Not everyone's out to betray you, kid. You just never knew the real story."

"Then tell me." Fists clenched, Nightwing slammed a hand onto the counter, glaring. "Tell me the real story behind Wally's death. _Tell me why._"

"Don't you want to hear the grand plan involving little Elliot here first?" Red X drawled. "Calm down, bird boy. You're scaring him..."

It was true: Kyd Wykkyd was now practically cowering behind his guardian. And despite his casual tone, Red X looked anything but amused.

He'd lost control. Over Red X of all people. It was enough to kill his anger, and Nightwing sank against the wall. "I'm sick and tired of this," he muttered. "I'm fucking sick of your games."

"Games are all I have left to play," Red X countered calmly. "Elliot hasn't been himself in over a decade and it was his own conscious choice to save Jinx. What does he have left? But he knew what it entailed. During the time of West's and Jinx's torrid affair, West never knew when his girlfriend caught her freak disease, only that she _did_."

"What did he do then?" Nightwing started, but then stiffened. "Was that when..."

"Bingo. Distancing himself from the Teen Titans was his _own_ conscious decision. He hadn't wanted to get you guys involved in the shit the H.I.V.E. were in, so he teamed up with them instead. Followed Gizmo around, chased after the ever elusive remnants of the Brotherhood of Evil...ah, good times."

"We were _finished_ with the Brotherhood."

"You guys only froze their asses, tossed them into prison, and threw away the key. Actually, not even then. You weren't 'finished' with them—don't glare at me like that, kid. West didn't end up killing anybody. Wasn't even that brat, Gizmo. It was all Blood."

"Start at the beginning. Now."

"You know that the virus originated from some nefarious experiment of the Brain's, right? Or maybe it was that asswipe monkey..."

"Get on with it."

"Right. Gizmo liked to play with things. Big things. When the showdown between _you _guys and the Brotherhood of Evil happened, the H.I.V.E. Five were there, too. Short one member, of course, but if Jinx was sure of one thing, it was that her old team was lazy as all fuck. Why would they willing join up in ultra evil villain hijinks when they were only interested in screwing with small-time crime? Unless..."

"Don't tell me—."

"Ah." Even in that raspy, wheezing voice, Red X managed to sound grim. "And there's the crux of the matter. Without Jinx's mollycoddling and such on the team, the smartest underling stepped up to the plate and took a bitter front against good guys plus converts_—_a.k.a. _Jinx_."

Nightwing, unseen under his mask, flicked his eyes towards Kyd Wykkyd and back to his long time enemy. "Mikron was not as stupid as to use untested biological weaponry."

"_Mikron_ wasn't quite Mikron yet. Sure, Gizmo liked his tech, but Blood has a strange fondness for biological warfare...the kid _hated_ to use it, especially what he did to Jinx."

"Why feel regret? He stole the virus to use it on her."

"True...broke into their databank, flitted through their files, and downloaded all their pretty little secrets. Twisted it up a bit and..voila, he'd made the virus a specially packaged finished product." Red X paused delicately. "Of course, let's not forget the Teen Titans had only come to this bit of knowledge because a certain teammate of theirs, oh, I don't know...caught it as well? Certainly, they couldn't keep their noses where they didn't belong after that..."

"I _thought_ that Wally was keeping it from me."

"What, the cure? _Moron. _So West roughed you guys up a bit...and you snap after jumping to conclusions? As I remember it, West keeping you guys busy allowed his new crew to flit away unnoticed...he'd done his job. He'd kept you away. But not once you tried to figure out the kid's ulterior motive? My, my..."

"It was a _mistake_." Nightwing's lips were tight lipped and his voice was bit through gritted teeth. "What else were we supposed to assume?"

Red X shrugged, adopting a casual tone. "Well, it's all in the past, right, kid? It wasn't like West was tracking down the last vestiges of the Brotherhood organization all over the world or anything...to look for a cure. No, of course not."

Nightwing glared.

Red X shrugged again. "The kid had speed, and they needed a cure. Jinx was his dying _girlfriend_, so of course she would be his top priority. He honestly had no idea Gizmo's stupid handling of the disease ended up being loose in Jump City. Give him a break, kiddo; it's not like goth girl died from that little episode."

"She recovered on her own, but we had no idea she would at the time! How...tell me, X, _how_ were we supposed to know otherwise?"

"West had no idea. You guys had no idea that _he_ had no idea. You're both even. Aren't you a little bit curious to what happened to Jinx?"

"She's alive," Nightwing said flatly. "She's alive and a criminal and fully and completely _lucid_. I don't need to know what happened to her."

"Whatever viral side effects were bringing Raven down had nothing on what happened to Jinx," Red X answered just as flatly. "In case you haven't realized, bird brain, but Gizmo wasn't exactly a biotechie _guy_. He specialized in electronics and machines. He wouldn't have known that a fucked over disease like the one he'd modified would have had such disastrous consequences in Jinx's system. Her own magic was eating her alive, kid. Bet you didn't know that, huh?"

"You're lying. She would be _dead_ by now."

"You seem...shocked. Dare I say it that that demon chick was able to bounce back from her disease, no problem at all?"

Nightwing was snarling. "So Jinx had top priority, X. Hurry up and tell me what you've been getting to all this time."

"Still a compassionless bastard, I see. World still too black and white for you? You just can't fucking admit that you think West died for the wrong side. Is that what you think?"

Nightwing jerked away from the wall and started to pace, taunt and furious and all strained control, but Red X only cocked his head. "Hit a sore spot, did I?" he said, and the metallic twang through the mask was a little cool.

He stopped abruptly. "If Wally didn't die in vain, then what did he die _for_? He told me...nothing. Absolutely nothing at all! He only said—"

"The agreement was for you to come to _not_ come right now. What the hell did you think my orders were for? _Yes_, damn you, they were orders! Kiddo, by the time the Catalyst rolled around, you were already half-way across the fucking country to your precious Blüdhaven. By the time the Teen Titans finally stopped tripping over themselves in trying to be the good guys in every single freaking situation, Raven was already healing up nicely. Without your steady string of orders, your quack team was doing a hell of a job sticking their noses into everything."

The vigilante said nothing, only stared coldly.

Behind the mask, Red X spat, "By that time...you were so sick of being little, helpless Robin that you went ahead and up and left the place without first finding out _their_ side of the story. The H.I.V.E. Five weren't just villains—they were beginning to regroup and gather straggling teenage villains for mutual protection. You couldn't see past the fact that Jinx couldn't let go of her roots, of her old teammates, and that the Flash was not a cut-and-dry superhero. You realized that you two had become two people. Scared fuck you were, you assumed _Gizmo_ off and betrayed the lot of them and sometime, somewhere, killed Wally West."

"Mikron was making a name for himself by the time the Catalyst—"

"Well, damn," he snapped. "I guess you were happy in your assumptions because you happy go-lucky _freaks_ who stood up for the helpless innocents of the U.S. of fucking A. had no idea that the very people you were protecting were the very people who were going to kill you all."

"That isn't true! The Justice Elite would have never allowed it. Those were _rumors_, X! The government was not so corrupt as to do what terrorists like _Mikron_ claimed they would. There was no genocide of metahumans. There were no killings in that context."

"Genocide? Fuck it, America wasn't _capable_ of genocide? When the fuck were you so naïve and why the hell didn't any of your past tutelage teach you anything?"

And when Nightwing slammed a fist against the wall, Red X could only give a sharp hiss. "Bastard," the frustrated man muttered. "Elliot. Get into the backroom." He didn't turn when he had addressed his ward.

Nightwing flinched; he'd completely forgotten the little boy was in the room with them. He'd lost control again...why? Why was it always with _Red X_...?

"If...it was true..." he started.

Red X gritted out a sigh and latched the backdoor shut. When he was turning his wheelchair around to face Nightwing again, he seemed considerably calmer. "Listen, kid. Just...listen. Churn that damn brain and yours and _think_. What was the H.I.V.E. advocating as they started to gain influence?"

"Refuge. Jinx was..." Nightwing held back a scoff, "...she was _helping_ to gather supervillains together, but Mikron soon took over operations. She didn't even care."

"That's not the point. Keep going."

"And there were no protests." His dark mood broke at his own surprise. "To the public, there was no strife within the H.I.V.E., not even with the hostile relations with the rest of the metahuman community. What did Mikron do? Couldn't any of them see that they were fools to follow him?"

"Of course," Red X intercepted smoothly. "Why do you think Jinx is still considered the leader today? Mikron eventually broke off with his own faction. They had their own goals, their own plans...plans too radical for the scared villains who sheltered themselves in the combs of H.I.V.E.. Cowards and idiots, but Jinx wasn't going to refuse their presence, not when they were so willing to cooperate with her in maintaining the H.I.V.E. as one body. Mutual protection against a public that wanted to destroy them."

But Nightwing was preoccupied with something else he'd said. "Plans too radical...? No—it can't be..." He went very still. "There were—_rumors_. Villains were frenzied in the west, but news eventually reached Gotham...that there was a massive retaliation effort. That there were terrorists who were calling on their help for chaos. Ruthless, mass destruction. That was the only thing that Mikron was calling for."

"The second year into the Catalyst and Mikron was already tearing up the country. The first year were quiet attacks. A strike against a company here. A sharp spike of bankruptcy there. Carefully, very carefully, the first phase of his plans came about as the economy was sneakily starting to plunge."

Red X sighed. "I stayed out of it as much as I could, but even when H.I.V.E. had started to split apart with Mikron's little rebellion, there were those agents who were still under his influence. They were to ones to help...he and his buddies hardly had the numbers to back them up for the first plan to come into effect. Jinx was...a bit pissed. Didn't see it at first until there were insubordinations left and right."

"It was the same time that she publicly announced her supervillain status. H.I.V.E. had been too good at flying beneath our radar. It'd happened so fast, within only a year before the Catalyst." He grimaced. "_The missing year._ We never knew."

"Of course you didn't. Jinx's _sole_ purpose was to help keep the H.I.V.E. together and hidden. Sanctuary. Elysium. Pretty names for the simple concept of refuge...and there _were_ villains out there who were scared shit of what was happening, kid. Amateurs playing at the big league. They decided to take up crime in a year where the government decided to be a bit creative in their solutions."

Nightwing tensed. "What you said about the public was true...there was no idealism in the concept of superheroes by that time. We all knew that, but it doesn't mean there'd be such fear to justify...There was _no hint_ of the genocide you're talking about."

"No, of course not," Red X countered calmly, "because they were executing supervillains."

* * *

Gizmo stole an incomplete project from the Brotherhood of Evil—a virus—with the intent of using it on traitor!Jinx, but he didn't end up using it; someone else stole it off of him and finished the job. Post-series, the Brotherhood is still around but severely weakened. They're gone at this point, but you have to admit...pretty diabolical of them to begin making a virus targeted for superhero magic-users.

No Terra-Jericho conclusion yet, but as Terra isn't random, she'll be back. And people seem to think Slade's important, but he's really not. Wouldn't it be interesting to know what _he_ did in the last 20 years of Gimmick's, though?

Nightwing left the Titans 5ish years after the end of the series, roughly around the same time Jinx was revealed to be sick. The first time he visited Jump again was after the Catalyst, _after_ a blockade was set up to separate eastern and western continental USA, and after Nightwing checked up on his old city, he headed over towards Steel to meet Red X. Red X had earlier contacted Nightwing because, with Jinx freed, a Take-Down-Brother-Blood plan was supposed to be put into effect. Nightwing isn't needed, but Red X is taking advantage of all his resources and contacts.


	13. G'V: Solace II

This chapter is a monster of roughly 9000 words. That's all I've got to say. Done in four parts and I can finally introduce Raven. Someone asked after her way earlier and I thought, "Hey, how screwed up can she be?"

* * *

"You recovered so quickly, I wondered why the other shoe hadn't dropped yet. You lied when you apparently bounced back up from your little drama spree, this so-called magical disease." A pause. "Oh, yes. Cutie, cutie gumdrops and all, but it's not like I get sorceresses dropped on my doorstep everyday, you know."

"..."

"...Disabled ones, in any case. Your glorious leader doesn't know? Don't make me laugh. Kid, just dealing with me should make you remember what a fiasco a lack of _trust_ can do to a team. Or did you forget?"

She shook her head, letting her hands loosen from their tight hold. Her mouth opened to speak, only to mutter something low and barely audible.

"So I've heard. Word is that spice girl's up and left the scene...what, old news? And now Bird Boy's going crazy, I hear. Or should I start calling him Nightwing?" He came in from beyond the doorway and stopped where she stood. He looked up and peered into her hooded face, evidently searching for something. She hardly had any time to tense—couldn't even do so—when his scrutinizing was suddenly over.

He wheeled past her with a chuckle, giving her a _look_. She didn't even need to have seen it to know what arrogance must've been twisting his features under that mask. That smirk was so tangible at that moment, so obvious was he in making his opinions on the matter, but she didn't feel like throttling him. Or cursing him. Not even an insult came to mind—although many should've. After all, that was what she did, right? Wield a sardonic front and burrow herself in sarcasm, drowning in her own jaded pool of...of bitterness? Was she bitter, just then, as she turned to look Red X in the face?

Nary a thought crossed her mind that resembled anything of her former self. There was nothing particularly annoyed about her gaze, whereas her teammates were able to draw forth a whole slew of variations...as if it were a game. She had the vaguest sense, a revelation, even, that the man before her knew what was going on inside of her. She wondered, absently, if this was what it felt to be underwater.

She'd been submerged before, but nothing like this. Because this wasn't being overwhelmed by currents or being put under the mere possibility that she could _drown _from the elements...no, this was something completely different. All urgency and motion and swirling impressions, it was nothing at all like dying.

Chaos. Tossed apart, this way and that, with absolutely no control over herself. It wasn't the matter of her powers or anything of the sort. It was more like—flying. Yes. Yes, that was it—_flying—_for what else was this dizzying feeling contorting in her beyond disbelief, sending her gasping and panting for breath and she wanted it to _stopstopSTO—_but it wouldn't. Not really.

She was startled when she realized nothing had happened at all. She was not flying or...or drowning in an unseemly manner. There was no water, no imbalance of orientation that sucker-punched her in the gut, catching her so fast that she...she...!

And the bastard was standing there, smugly, knowing what was happening to her.

There was a glass. It was placed between her and the world, and she knew she should've been feeling detached. She shouldn't have been feeling _anything_. There was a wall. It was invisible, and no one should have been able to sense it at all. Nobody. Alone. She was in a box—away, away, away—and nobody could possibly hurt her here. Nobody could have hurt her in her own _mindscape_. It was her creation—all of it. All hers, and nobody could touch her. Nobody could touch _her_.

She was behind glass, and she felt the world was faraway from her just then.

But if she was behind glass...people could still see her. Sense, taste, touch, feel—_see—_they could see her and she suddenly knew that if they understood...if they'd known at all what had happened to her...!

They would never have let her go. Things weren't all normal. She was never the catalyst to their fall, but she was adding onto that impossibly fast rolling ball that just kept doing downhill faster and faster and _stronger than she could stop it_, and it wouldn't stop. Not really. Not when she was tumbling with it. Not when her body kept twisting and breaking—she was dying. She was...dying?

Funny. She'd thought that if there was any way to lock away her emotions, any way at all she could stop those occasional spikes of _fear_ in her heart that whispered like oozing temptation how _nice_ it would have been to let it all go...

To bottle herself up and keep in her emotions was torture. But so was coming to terms with her own awakening. Her team was her catalyst for change. She _changed_ because of them. Not mentally or physically, but emotionally.

She'd thought if there was any way to make herself stop feeling so conflicted all the time—to smile or scoff? To shun or play?—and so confused, she'd have taken it. And she did; she'd known exactly what she'd been getting into when she broke _the thing most important to her_.

She was trapped like a caged bird behind impenetrable and hauntingly beautiful glass. And it was beautiful. So beautiful, in fact, she couldn't bring herself to strike a hand at it. Not because she was afraid of the results—whatever they may be—but there was this instinctive yearning for it to remain. Her body was calling for it, and she felt her mind would shatter with rips and tears and real liquid tears if _she_ was the one who managed to shatter her self-imposed prison. And this was a prison, was it not?

She looked and acted exactly how the others expected her to in the aftermath of those hellish few weeks. They thought, with great relief, how _wonderful_ and _strong_ she was to have endured such an episode. To have caught such a terrifying _disease_, after all, would've surely frightened her, but not _their_ Raven. Not _their _dark, mysterious teammate who could surely overcome all odds due to their bond, their strength, their _friendships, _because wasn't that how they'd beaten her monstrous father? Wasn't that how they'd come together after that incident, that final death, and _laughed_? Against unsurmountable odds, they had won and they were happy...weren't they?

She was beautiful and strong and nobody knew she was a robot in a skin that should've felt familiar, but didn't. Not really. How could it? She was behind glass—a material she should've been easily able to break—but she couldn't because she was trapped with all her pretty, little emotions that did nothing but bog her down...!

Trapped. Overwhelmed. She hadn't known this would happen—it was her greatest dream just then, wasn't it? To feel. To love. She thought how wonderfully glorious this adventure, this dream, they were living in. She thought it would never end, this glorious stream of years filled with nothing but foolish playing.

She was wholly unprepared to deal with what a human _truly_ felt. Every. Single. Day. Was this what it meant to be human?

She looked out from beyond glass walls. She could see her body react. She could see her vocal cords working and swelling, but the words were automatic and mechanic. No feeling. Dull. Blank. Why couldn't any of them see...? Surely, _surely_, she was not so secretive, private, and stoic that her teammates would assume that all was well with her—?!

So she functioned. And lived. Perhaps the farce was too well made. Perhaps she tried _too hard_ to keep her private battles just that—private. What she really felt, what she really wanted to say...she couldn't. It wasn't a matter of willpower, or lack of it, but it was that she physically could not bring herself to _do _so. To be honest with her teammates like she had done in what she'd assumed were her final days on this plane of existence...

What a fake she was. Her outer shell knew exactly how to react and exactly what to say to keep the suspicions off of her. But the days were changing. They were growing darker and darker.

She watched her team fall apart. She _watched_ them fall _apart_. She didn't do a thing to stop it, either, not even when she saw the disastrous spindly lacerations of poison that was making its way into her team, worming into their bond like the cracks on old cement. She thought them invincible.

She thought wrong.

Red X said she was disabled. Was she truly? Not when she felt every emotion so clearly for the first time in her life, right? Wasn't that a blessing?

Not when she was trapped in Nevermore, existing on two planes simultaneously. Oh, yes, she could feel her emotions. She was trapped in her mind's own landscape _she_ had created from the start with only fragile glass keeping her away from her teammates...

She couldn't bring herself to strike at that glass. She was so scared of the outside world, of what she would find. The Titans were descending into madness. She had no clue as to the catalyst of their fall—that glorious, glorious fall, filled with the disappearance of their brilliant, shining red star. She was not the catalyst, but neither was she _not _contributing to that downhill roll either.

Revealing her new...problems. What use would that be? How much more battered could her team become if she let slip what was the problem...? How much more could they take? She saw. She saw clearly what others did not. And she knew...the Teen Titans were _falling_. There was nothing she could do, nothing at all.

And she tried. God, she'd tried. But whenever she did so, whenever she stood up to confront her own demons and face that mirrored glass...

She didn't see any demons. Happy, Brave, Timid—they weren't _there_ anymore. They were inside of her now like pulsing, living beings. They were completely _hers_ now and she had nothing to be afraid of more. She no longer felt that horrible split that had divided her psyche so thoroughly before. She was whole. She was one.

Rather, she _liked_ this isolation of her. She liked...this denial. A safety net—_nothing_ could touch her here. Her glass was beautiful and impenetrable. Nothing would invade her sanctuary—this was bliss. This was _her_ life. How dare they presume she would threaten her own Elysium in order to struggle against the inevitability of their self-destruction?!

She was sick, sick, sick _tired_ of it all. She wanted rest. She'd been fighting her whole life. Couldn't she afford a little peace now? Why couldn't the world give her a break for once? Was it so selfish to take, with her own hands, the sleep she'd wanted for so long? Would friends calling themselves her friends truly begrudge her of that? Her teammates were falling apart. The world was rushing headlong towards a doom all too familiar to her. She felt this before. That time—_that time—_their bond had strengthened their resolve, erased them of their weaknesses, forced them to stand up and fight—!

_It's warm. This feeling_.

The one who led them. The one who believed in her—believed in _them_. The one who brought that ragtag team to the height of their capacity.

_It's warm. This feeling._

_He's smiling._

But suddenly she was faced with the angry countenance of one Nightwing. Only, he wasn't Nightwing _yet_, was he? Surely not. Surely He was still her Robin. Surely He was still her anchorage, still in existence. Surely, surely, He was still the boy who'd for one mere moment had been one with _her_? How could He have forsaken such a bond like theirs? How could He even have _thought_ to threaten it at all? With His selfish, damn behavior, speeding off towards the opposite of the goddamn _country_...!

No. He didn't exist anymore. That boy, _He,_ was gone. Instead, it was Nightwing, the one who abandoned them in the end. Fled like the fledging he was—pathetic! Worthless bastard of a _boy_ she'd invested so much in!

So he was the one living now while He was dead to the world. Friends...were they friends at the very least...right? He wouldn't forsake...friendships. Preaching and prattling and lecturing—He had fought _for_ those damn bonds, Him and the others, but would _he_, this man, this man who was both that boy and a struggling adult...would he?

She was a coward, wasn't she. Consumed and overwhelmed by the bliss that had finally entered her life—she could forget this pain. She could live blindly behind glass and forget...this agony of having wings torn from the muscles of one's back. What a sensation it was to finally be ripped from the skies and thrown back down to earth because of the absence of wings...

Nobody ever noticed the sacrifices she bore so easily in return to saving herself from that disease. Sickly, rotting, foul and...fetid. She could have let herself die. Her magic was being deformed, twisted, and toyed with. The disease had wreaked havoc on her system and sent her straight into the confides of her mindscape in order to confront the chaos that had ensued in the aftermath...

All of them, the emotions running her head, had that deep, innate will to live rise up like a torrent of panic and urgency and pain. _We want to live_.

_We want to live._

_**LET US LIVE**._

They'd utterly released themselves and flung their essence all over Nevermore. They no longer held concrete, tangible forms, but she felt and tasted them as if they were right there beside her. She could _see_ them, their will to live. That instinctive, raw urge of desire. That will _to _will. But they knew they couldn't stop her, not even when this was their first willing act of treason against her—their Creator, their Owner, their Host, whichever—and they knew her choice even before _she_ knew she had that choice and, oh god, she'd...!

She'd taken it. Knowledge was a part of her and soaked up the world's impressions around her like a needy, greedy child. Selfish to the core, but shrewd enough to block _certain things_ from the one they mattered the most.

Her.

Knowledge...how many times had that entity kept things from her, only to reveal them at the most opportune time? How many times had a being in her _head_ manipulated her for the greatest yield?

Not that time.

_So you want to get rid of us?_

_...Fine. It won't be easy. You may not even like the results._

_Such a convenient disease the monstrous Insect had unleashed upon us..._

_Our Host wants to break free._

_Do you want to break free..._

_Raven?_

And like the selfish, needy, greedy _child_ she was, she grasped Knowledge by the forcibly materialized throat and ripped it clear apart from the body. And blood, fake yet crimson, poured all over her and in that moment she felt the world churn and turn because she _felt_ it all—everything Knowledge had ever kept back from her. Every revelation and every sensation and every tidbit of know-how that she'd ever and would ever categorize in her _head_ suddenly swamped and overwhelmed her in homecoming...!

Were her mind a beehive, then the disease was the godsend bear that'd been the for her, the Queen, to rip herself out of the bosoms of her suffocatingly overbearing drones, but—?

That glass wall. She hadn't noticed it before, but it was spattered with the blood of the fallen. They formed spots that pulsed and leeched upon whatever life force was _feeding_ the glass, and they formed like fetid tumors ready to burst out pus...Almost in a bewildered manner, she looked around at her surroundings, left and right, as if she didn't know how they quite got there in the first place. The bemusement of a child.

And when she glanced up again, she could no longer see through the glass. And if she touched that wall, ran a caressing hand against that living, breathing matter, it reacted to her. Like a babe pushing against a mother's breasts in a needy, greedy gesture of survival. Those fetid spots of blood had, for so long, been alone in a world brutally ripped apart and then carefully placed together again so as to hide its owner...and now it was homecoming. The mindscape would never be the same again. But they recognized their mother's touch.

They recognized their master.

A demented garden of abnormal growth, and she wondered why she felt sick every time the tumors turned their faces towards her in helpless, confused agony. The pain of a child who didn't understand why its creator had turned on its creation.

She didn't know what to do or how to respond. It felt all like a dream to her anyway—or at least...it should have been. This was her wall. This was her glass. She was safe. She was protected, and nothing could reach or touch her. She was impenetrable.

She no longer knew what was going on in the outside world. She was trapped, forever, between the desire to watch with wide, luminescent eyes the progress of those cancerous growths or the faint tugging of her heart for times past. Of a time when there was once a team. Of a time when their age was glorious. Of a time when there were such things as friends, when the concept didn't bewilder her as it bewildered her now...

Of a time when she'd never felt so unbearably alone.

"...It's okay, kiddo."

Raven dully turned her head, eyes unblinking and unfocused, but Red X only smiled. An ironic smile, so filled with mocking, but she couldn't bring herself to care. Not even when his mask was finally down.

The growth had no consumed the wall entirely. And it crawled along the floor—going for _her_.

But, damn him, she could still feel some sensation that he still wanted to smirk at her.

"You're unconscious, but you can hear me...right? Oh, don't get up. Please indulge me with a blink at the very least."

She closed her eyes.

"...can't talk, can't eat," he was saying, "...well, fuck, what _can _you do then? What do you want me to do, shove you into an asylum? That outta go for some laughs."

An asylum. How quaint. But it was a thought.

"...I hope you can hear me. I don't normally stow kids away in my, er, basement. Don't know what the hell you kiddos are up to these days, but you're going to help me so _stay the fuck alive_. Much I hate to admit it, kiddo, I kinda need—"

She was kneeling at the foot of the glass wall, which no longer resembled a glass wall. Perhaps the growth resembled ivy in a way, she mused absently. It was, after all, taking on the characteristics of that ground-crawling plant, with its spindly leaves reaching out to touch her, screaming...

And before she knew it, she looked down and saw that her legs were being slowly clawed at and were fastened tight against what her mind perceived to be the ground.

So. It had been a tumor after all. All latching tightness and desperation...a cancer that wanted to live. Or whatever was left of those desires—now only a mindless mass that thought of nothing but conquering.

Well, fine. That was all right with her. She didn't give a damn what that man did to her anyway.

In fact, she smiled at the growth and thought it quite funny.

_N-No...my friends...**GIVE ME BACK MY TITA**_...!

She blinked, vague confusion scrawled over her face, before shaking off the sensation. She gave into the temptation of stroking the matter. It now covered her legs and she didn't even mind how she could hardly look up into the sky anymore before the growth was now curling up her back like a lover and fastened a vice about her neck; she couldn't look up even if she had wanted to. And she didn't, not really, not when she longer had wings to fly! Of course not.

Cracking a grin at the inane thought, she wondered maybe she was a tad bit too obsessed with her namesake after all. She never had wings in the first place. Never ever...ever? But Raven only shrugged, and focused on the comfort her emotions were giving her.

Even when for one stark-clear moment, she wondered where that forlorn sky had suddenly gone and why she felt utter _terror_ at the thought that she couldn't see it anymore.

Slowly, blindly, she looked ahead with impossibly wide eyes and whispered, "...Terra?"

xx

If Terra had to describe how partial-possession felt like in one word, she wouldn't have been able to answer. One word was too restrictive, too detached, to properly explain away how Joe singlehandedly broke apart every law-of-whatever and theory-of-some-old-dead-guy because of his sheer freak factor.

Not to say that she didn't love him for it. He made things interesting. A small part of her admitted that one of the only reasons she did him a favor in transferring his consciousness from bytes to...well, animatronic-moving-bytes was because she was lonely. Having been offed made him insane via body-hopping-spirit-out-on-a-warpath, to which he encountered the Teen Titans on his one unlucky day and ended up being slammed into a harddrive by some crazy cyborg who just happened to have once been her teammate.

Really. Joe had loads of her sympathies, he really did. But that didn't mean she wasn't cursing him for his sudden insight of his own powers and ingenuity in its application.

For god's sake, _she_ was his living, breathing experiment.

What the hell did you call partial-possession, after all?

For the longest time, she was bothered by his forcible presence buzzing in the back of her mind. Those months were filled with headaches and migraines like no other and she kept asking him _When are you going to leave_? to which he never answered straight. A dead, floating spirit like him had a lot to adjust to when he suddenly had _partial_ freedom in a living, breathing body. Hence, she was his 'experiment' and she didn't really like it much either. He was existing in two different locations simultaneously, and the idea was a little more than creepy. But he was _Joe_, so it was okay.

Although, to be fair, had she not have been here, she wouldn't have begrudged him at all for his nifty trick. He was dead. He liked bodies. And she'd finally consciously decided to let him be. He was an opportunist, albeit a gentle, overbearingly _nice_ one. She couldn't fault him for taking advantage of the opportunities she'd so graciously thrown his way. She was asking for it, but then again...she let him.

She liked him. Almost a little too much. She'd kept putting off truly finishing his body because she hadn't wanted that buzzing sensation to leave her head. So they had the risk of some punk running off with his body parts.

Back when she was still this badass terrorist, she liked to play a little game. How fast could she complete an assignment before everyone died. How hard would it be to hold back that avalanche...it wasn't like she was out for everybody's blood. She just did her job, and doing secretive little things like that were things of relief.

To have complete control over earth had given her a sense of vindictive freedom. She relished it, enjoyed it, even, and buried long past memories deep down in order to forget. Slade had given her a way to harness her abilities. He'd given her control.

Fantastic control.

Eventually, she got sick of control. She was sick of wandering around with little company other than the elements. She was sick of crappy food and roughing it out with wild, maniacal animals. But the earth was her home and she found no faults with it.

It was predicable, safe. She knew exactly what to expect from it and it never hurt her. She was its master—and what slave would hurt its master?

She'd begun to experiment. Terrible experiments. Tests that were twisted from the start and used during her missions. She liked to see what worked and what didn't. She liked to see her limits, stretch them far and wide, and in the end...have them snap.

That one exhilarating moment where she'd lose control...she was crazed—_powerful_—and hadn't given a damn what was in her way.

Who was in her way...

By that time in her life, she was so sick of playing the goody goody for the world that she dived headlong into constant troubles.

Like Slade.

At least Jericho was a happy accident. He got her mind off of things, but when no one was looking, she'd—well, she was done with acting the pathetic drama queen. She was tired of regrets and old griefs that she eventually shut out her teenage years and focused solely on the present.

That did not explain why the hell she was _here_.

What was she doing?

Why was she doing this?

Raven was not her friend.

"Unconscious and vulnerable...you were so skittish towards the end, and now you're all peaceful." Terra's lips thinned into a smile and her grip on the other woman's hair tightened. "What did you get yourself into this time, you idiot?"

That damned countenance didn't even flinch. Actually, it didn't react much at all. It was enough to make her stomach lurch because...because she'd expected _something_. Her mere presence must inspire some antagonistic inclinations. She didn't expect to be ignored, after all. What Titan could possibly ignore her when she was in their face? But that was what the witch was doing, and Terra didn't believe for one second that Raven was catatonic, that she was perfectly content to be brain dead. Hell no, this wasn't the tenacious woman _she'd_ been teammates with.

What did that smuggling bastard expect her to do? Whip out some mechanical solution for something wholly magical? Healing Raven was a bit out of her expertise, but Red X had only demanded that she get in there and talk to the downed Titan. She just didn't yet know _why_ she should be doing such a thing in the first place. He didn't even mention anything about curing Raven, but why else would he call Terra over here?

If what she heard was correct...well, she never expect some maniacal bastard to let loose a genocide-inclined disease. It struck only magic users, she heard. Raven survived. Terra wished she hadn't; at least then she wouldn't have been put into this situation. She hadn't been in contact with any Titan since the golden era, back when they were these delusional kids out to _prove_ something to the world, that justice and some snit like that existed.

She didn't like Raven, but it wasn't like she hated her either. Her old bickering with the witch didn't even matter anymore—so inconsequential things were better left forgotten. Why was she helping the other woman? Who knew.

"Stay quiet, Joe," she snapped into the air. "I don't want to hear it."

She released Raven's hair immediately and stepped away from the bed. Rummaging through numerous pockets, she finally pulled out an obsidian pin. Holding it to the light, Terra's face was inscrutable before she cracked a smile and laughed. It wasn't a happy sound.

Holding out her arms grandly, she said, "Look at me, Joe, aren't I being the charitable one already? I built this thing because Red needed it ASAP when I could've been working on you."

Terra paused and dropped them to her side. She was glaring at the floor now. "...Suit yourself. I know you want a finished body. Hell, I want you to have one so you don't have to keep relying on me for my five senses. What do you want? Speak up! God, I'm such a fucking pushover...what do you think I'm here doing here, huh?"

She crammed the pin away, shrugging. "Fine. Let me give this thing to Red and then we'll see what's up with the witch—what? Don't call her that? The hell I won't. No. _No_, I'm not leaving you alone. What do you think her mind'll be like when her body's like that? Fuck it, Raven's mind isn't going to be a happy-happy cherry land."

"Still playing the schizo, I see."

"Ah," Terra said, turning. "How long were you...? No, don't answer that." She reached into a hidden pant compartment and freed the pin from its confines again, baggy pants swaying with her jerking motions; she was playing with the controls.

"Aren't you being the rough handler?" His words were said in an indulgent drawl. "I hope you don't damage the, ah, cargo with your innate fury."

"What fury?" she said.

"The little voice in your head..."

"He only pisses me off sometimes, but he is not open for discussion."

Red X gave a gesture. "Fine, fine. Have you decided whether or not you're going to do it?"

"Let's talk price."

"I've already paid for your Xenothium."

"What about this pin here?"

An airy shrug. "Not open for discussion, but I'm willing to negotiate."

"Throwing my words back at me...? Fine. I'm listening."

"You're not going to like this." Without waiting for her to speak, he continued. "Besides, girlie, you already know the little rules between us. I smuggle you some scrap metal for your little boy back home and you dig up some hearty chunks of Xenothium for me. Now that I'm upping the stakes by asking you for favors...eh, you're hardly going to give me any, but it's not like I'm going to give you what you want either."

"And now you're asking me to possess someone insane."

"Nah. Just that little voice in your head—he wants to do it, doesn't he? What a great kid. It's no secret poor old Cyborg broke his heart over sealing that kid up and good in a computer chip. I always knew the Teen Titans were good for laughs, but I'm surprised! That kid still wants to stick by you, huh?"

"No. Fucking. Ideas. I am not handing him over to you."

Chuckling low, he went past her and stopped at the foot of Raven's bed. Idly watching some monitors nearby, Red X said, "Too late, girlie. How'd you think I drew up the blueprints for my remote control? I had you guys in mind. Be awestruck, girlie, because the results are going to be spectacular."

Terra scoffed. She folded her arms across her chest with a sneer. "Right. And why am I handing over this pretty piece of technology to you?"

A sigh. "D'you really want to know?"

"There's a lot I want to know. For example, why you have _Raven _of all people holed up in your basement. However, I don't give a damn whatever machinations you want to pull off now. I don't even care if this pretty thing's supposed to take over the world."

"...Take over the world? That's droll. Not creative at all."

"Can it. What am I supposed to do?"

"Thought you weren't going to do it?"

She brushed past him. With a flick of her hair, she said, "Not unless you give me a good reason."

"Right. I get it, you don't want a nice romp through Raven's head. Perfectly understandable. I'm bored, girlie. Bored as hell. With my girl Jinx in jail _again_ and H.I.V.E. being a bother, I happened to run into Raven here. Seems she snagged herself a disease or some other shitty thing like that back before the ...only, it's causing some seriously sick problems now."

"Mm. And...?"

"She's _it_, girlie. I don't have any use for her...she self-destructed all on her own. Convenient, isn't it."

"Huh." She tossed the pin over to him, which he caught easily. Eyes closing, she clutched her face with a gloved hand and said, "You...you're telling me that the missing piece is here? Are you screwing with me...?"

Red X turned to roll away. "You already know the answer to that, kid."

Head ducked, piercing blue eyes opened to glare between fingers. On the contrary, Terra's grin was nothing but ferocious. "...All right. All right, you bastard, this is a fine payment you've given me. But you knew that from the start once you called me, didn't you? To think...she came to you on her own! This is fucking great. I'll rape her mind for all it's worth and drag the answers out of her if I have to..."

He left, but she hardly noticed. Smile maniacal, she threw back her head and laughed, "Too good...t-too good to be true!...And you're going to help me, Joe. Don't shake your head at me—I've been living for _twenty years_ for this moment! How long have I been tracking him...that man who's been in bed with the government! He's mine...all mine. I'm going to kill him. _I'm gonna kill him_. And you're going to help me...!"

She thrust her hand towards Raven when her arm jerked to a stop. Gaze flaring with indignation, she gritted her teeth and pushed forward, but to no avail. Although her body flailed in her single minded effort to get to the bedridden Titan, her one arm didn't move.

Not even bothering to try with the other, she dropped both to her side. Tightening an angry, impotent fist, she whipped around and slammed it into the wall. It rang out clear with her screams, "Why? Why, why, why..._why_?! Why are you stopping me?! I am this close to finding out all the answers and you're keeping me from my goal! Twenty years I've been searching for this man who...cast me aside! Damn him—DAMN HIM! He killed you, too, Joe! _Don't you dare deny it!_"

Her expression fell. Something hallow and incredulous crept into her tone. "...What? You—you forgive him?" Terra stood still, then slapped both hands against the wall, head hanging in between. "Damn it. _Damn it_. I...I can't let this go—!" Sliding down to the floor, her frame started to shudder as her features twisted constantly between her frustration and anger and confusion. "...Why. Why did any of this happen...why?"

Face pressed down on the cool, metal floor, Terra cried.

"_...It wasn't supposed to be like this!"_

xx

Even when for one stark-clear moment, she wondered where that forlorn sky had suddenly gone and why she felt utter _terror_ at the thought that she couldn't see it anymore.

Slowly, blindly, she looked ahead with impossibly wide eyes and whispered, "...Terra?"

'Terra' said nothing.

Pupils suddenly sharped and narrowed in her panic. Raven ripped herself from her organic bonds and scooted backwards until she hit the pulsating glass. Her gaze was terrified. "...It wasn't supposed to be like this!"

"Raven..." An anguished inflection that both sounded everything and _nothing_ like Terra. "_Raven_. I-it's been awhile. Please don't be afraid..."

The woman stopped trembling. Instead, she shook her head slowly, disbelieving. "No...you're _dead_. You're not here. No one can be here."

"Who's dead, Raven? Terra? Or..."

"_No_! Both of you. All of you! Dead, my friends are all..." Something seized her throat just then and, no longer able to go on, Raven started crawling away. "G-go away. I don't want you here! You're not supposed to be here. You're not here, you're not here..."

_Let me talk to her._

_Let me talk to that bitch._

_LET ME FIND OUT ABOUT SL—!_

"Be _silent_," Jericho said.

Raven collapsed on the ground and rolled onto her back, chuckling and sobbing and laughing all at once. "I'm crazy," she said. "I knew it."

"Raven, listen to me." Gentle frustration marred his voice now. "I'm going to ask you some questions that only you can answer." Firmness now. "I'm going to have to ask you to get a hold of yourself."

Her laughter abruptly cut off. Drained, she stared up at that not-quite sky and laid there, exhausted. She glanced at him from her peripheral vision. "No."

"No?" Jericho, in Terra's body, stepped towards her, ignoring the growth that clawed at his feet.

She swallowed. "You're not supposed to be here."

"I already am." Sorrow was clear on Terra's face before he smiled with curved lids and leaned over her. "Please excuse me..."

His smiling unnerved her and Raven was quick to scramble to her feet. She watched him warily as he held up bare hands. "I don't want to steal your knowledge, so please cooperate."

"How are you in her body." Raven tore through the landscape with her clawing gaze. "Where is Terra?"

"Where is Slade?"

Raven shook her head. "He's dead. Go! You've come to the wrong place for answers."

"Where was Slade nearing the advent of the Catalyst?"

She took a step back. "The Catalyst...? I don't know...I don't know any of this. I don't know what you're talking about! Why are you asking me these things? Isn't enough that they're gone! They aren't coming back...they aren't..." Hiding her face in her hands, her words came out stricken and muffled. "He's ruined us, you know."

"Slade?"

"Our Robin. But then...he was never our Robin. This new man he'd become...Nightwing..." She looked up, blinking. "It was a trap. We didn't know. And we ate the bait Slade left for us."

"Tell me," Jericho said, features gentle and coaxing.

"It wasn't supposed to be like this...and we never saw that Robin was as restless as he was—" she broke off, struggling, "...you'd...you'd understand why we chose to ignore it, didn't you? I didn't want to see. None of us did. Never again. He'd promised us. _Never again_. He was consumed by Slade. It was supposed to be all over. It had ended! We'd won against my father...he wasn't supposed to show up again, that man. Slade..."

Raven's smile wide and disbelieving. "C-can you understand how we felt when Slade came back? He'd told Robin down when they were together in hell...that nothing had changed. They'd been allies! He found me...what did Slade go for? What did he want? _Why did he betray my father_? I don't know...I don't know any of this! And yet...yet not five years later _he came back_ and he wanted to destroy us. Completely."

Jericho gave a terse nod. "He was working for the...government at the time. What did he do to you, my comrades, my friends...?" He clasped her shoulders, face twisting with pain. "Why did the Teen Titans dissemble? Was it because of my father? Or was it—"

"Jericho..." her voice cracked. "Jericho, we thought you were with him. We thought you'd betrayed us."

He released a sigh, a plaintive sound. "I thought as much."

"But the way Slade said it, when he was laughing at how good it felt to have killed you—that can't be true. He was lying. He hadn't wanted to kill you. He was hurt. Like a real human being, he was feeling pain. Like a human. But we hated him and were afraid. _Robin_ hated him and was afraid. I didn't know what to do, what to say to him. He turned so cold..." Raven covered her mouth and looked like she was about to retch. "When...when you came back to us...you were crazed as you possessed bodies, all of our allies, our friends...Slade had warned us—we thought he was lying—that you'd be coming for us. But it happened! We couldn't believe it..."

"It's a lie. I...was not myself."

"I know." Raven squeezed blurring eyes shut, whispering, "But what were we to _believe_?...I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, Jericho...don't leave me. Don't go. I don't know what I'm doing here. Where did everyone...?"

"You asked after Terra."

"Terra...yes, yes, I did."

"I'm...helping her find my father."

"Why?" she said. "Why does she want to do such a thing? Back then, after we'd defeated the Brotherhood of Evil, back when we'd come back home, when Beast Boy had said that he saw..."

"No. That is...it's because—" Jericho flinched and threw up a hand against his temple, ducking his head. His gritted teeth was out of alarm and pain, and Raven snapped open her eyes and clutched him out of alarm. "Jericho...Jericho! Jericho, Jericho, what's wrong? Why are you..."

"..._Get off me_!" Terra ripped herself from Raven's grasp and stumbled away, gasping. "Too...too damn hard to get my own damn body back! You idiot...we're not here to make nice."

Bewildered, Raven stared. She held out a wavering hand. "Where...what happened to Jericho? Where is Jericho?...What did you do to him?!"

"Screw off," she spat, slapping Raven's hand away. "Don't bother to call him. We're not here to reminiscence about the good old days. Where is that man? Where is Slade?! Tell me. Tell me now."

Raven breathed heavily, her fists working themselves, opening and closing. "What...what have you done with my friend?!"

Furious, Terra sneered at the sky. "You promised me _info_, Red! Is this what I came for? Is it?" She snapped her gaze back at her old teammate and glared. "How pathetic are you? You're running away again, acting like the miserable drama queen you are. Everyone's gone! Hell, they're probably dead. Get a clue, witch! Bird Boy's not coming back! Starfire _isn't_ coming back! Not even Cyborg's around anymore, good _riddance_, because he's the reason Joe has had to suffer for all these years!"

"What? No, but that's..."

Terra grasped the other woman's shoulder and slammed her up against the wall. "_What don't you get_? Stop living in the goddamn past and grow up because we aren't kids playing at superheros anymore." Disgusted, she flung Raven away from her. Her jaw was set like stone. "Get real! No one's going to save you, me, _anybody_. I don't know what the hell you've been doing all these years—held up in Red's basement? Angsting all in your own little world? Goddamn it, I bet you don't even have a clue what the hell the _Catalyst _is—but it pisses me off!"

"How dare you..." Raven trembled on the ground, long hair lank and between the two of them. She slowly got to her feet, head still bowed and hair still lank. "You...Terra, you..._DON'T FUCK WITH ME_!" she roared.

Terra's gave a sharp grin and lunged back. "That's what I'm talking about! Here, demon, demon, demon...come out and _play_!"

Raven, face alight with terrible, malicious glee, flung herself forward, red eyes glowing with an unholy fervor.

xx

It was supposed to have been easy. Fix Joe up and go into retirement. Ever since Red had confirmed for her that Slade was really _dead_...well, she supposed she'd been chasing a phantom for all these years.

Why else had she joined up on what Gizmo was selling? Delusional, that one, but he had charisma. He had power. And she, frustrated with the world, was pulled in by his campaign and found it a terrible blessing by how much of a glorious distraction it was to blow things up.

So. She'd been a terrorist. She'd even grown to respect that little bastard. He was their _leader_. He was their _Mikron_, and she full heartedly supported him in every step of the way. The Catalyst...that glorious three part plan that should've revolutionized the country—no, the _world_, even.

Why had she joined? Why had she set herself up for that disappointment? When word got out that he—_he, _their leader, their Mikron, their _everything—_died...

She quit. She'd been lured in by the promise that the government would be left _hurting_ by their actions. Only, it wasn't the government hurting in the end; it was the whole damn _world_, and she'd—

She never did find Slade. Madness must have struck her—find Slade? _Find_ that man and...and...do what? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Hadn't she swore to herself that she was done with metahumans and superheros and goddamn villains so long ago? So, yes, Mikron was a distraction. A distraction that eventually turned into her life.

And then he was gone. She wandered. She survived. She picked up the odd job here and there and scavenged for money and technological bits and pieces she could sell on the black market. After the Catalyst, everyone was left reeling and no one was left unscathed. She took advantage of the peoples' needs—who hadn't?—and she'd eventually gotten into smuggling at the biggest, baddest metahuman city around called Steel...

Around the same time she'd met Red X.

But he was a whole another chapter that she didn't want to get into. Smuggling was a minor job description for her. It wasn't like she was dedicated to the art or anything. She just found use in her abilities to _dig_ up stuff, that was all. Xenothium was making a comeback and everyone and everything out there wanted in on its revival. Technology was power. Power was security, safety, and livelihood.

And that was what people wanted, was all. Cheap assurances that another Catalyst wouldn't hit them.

Sometime during those years of digging, mining, savaging, and selling, she found Jericho. She never regretted it, not once, that she found him in the first place. The one to have freed him from that hell...

Fine. She'd been lonely. That was why she bothered at all to keep this crazy, psycho kid who was dead and possessing a _computer chip_ of all things. The crazy, psycho kid who'd also, by the way, tried possessing _her_ in their first meeting...

Crazy kid succeeded, too. And what was the first thing he did? Go foraging near the continental border dividing up east and west America. Which was just sheer stupidity. What was he _thinking_, doing something like that? She could count on one finger of the people who'd actually been insane enough to have pulled off a stunt like that and _succeeded_.

She didn't bother with the other half of the country—there was just no point anymore and it was too much of a bother. America was practically two separate countries, anyway, and dealing with the west coast was enough stress for her.

After she found out Slade was either really, really dead or really, _really_ good at hiding, she'd given up. She'd felt apathy sink in and she just didn't have the energy to chase after the ghosts of her past anymore. Why not leave it alone, she thought.

But truthfully, the only reason she'd given up was because of Joe.

He never said anything of the sort, but she suspected he knew it, too, that she cared enough about another human being to have completely given up nearly fifteen years' worth of grief.

She loved him. Whether in a romantic or platonic matter, it didn't matter. She cared for him those first years of traveling with him in a way that was almost...nostalgically maternal. She didn't know what she felt for him anymore.

She knew she could only remember the bare snatches of her mother. She knew her parents were Russian and that made her a Russian child. She knew they were important people in some way from the country she'd been born in, but...

She remembered her mother's touch, her father's smile—her _real_ father. Not the bastardized role Slade played, but her real flesh and blood.

She wished Joe knew this. She knew it was also impossible, but she still wished he knew just what she would do for him, what she'd given up already. Partial-possession only went so far as to allow a spirit to borrow her ears, her voice, her eyes, her senses and _emotional capability_...while simultaneously existing in another location. Building a metal container for him was easy. Allowing him to move out of her head was a completely different matter. But she finished his body without a fuss and quietly let him leave her subconsciousness completely. For forever, probably. Who'd want only the partial experience when he could have it all?

Still. There had been this terrible, empty feeling of _loss_ in her that nearly choked her and clawed horribly at her eyes so that she'd nearly cried, and—it didn't matter. It was _Joe's_ time to shine to have a second chance at living, to be able to walk around by his own power. To be able to finally be in complete and utter control of a body...

How could she have ever refused him of that joy? When his spirit finally left her and settled into his metallic skin for the first time, it'd been uncomfortable for him, she could tell. She thought that it hadn't worked, that nearly a decade's worth of sweat and blood and tears had been wasted on a project that never had a chance in hell from the start, but then—

Those empty eye sockets had _shined_. They gleamed with the fervor that only came with real, genuine life. It'd been exhausting for him to reconfigure his soul to accept the uncomfortable, cold presence of technology, but he'd done it. He was happy, happy, _happy_...

She'd given him a lyre. She'd given him her companionship. She'd given him her promise that they'd do nothing but lay low and live contently _together_...selling whatever. They had to get by somehow. Red had helped them established a rep and, suddenly, they were known as the _Golden Pair_. The duo who you wanted to go in order to _get stuff_ because she never abandoned her contacts, her experience, and her street sense...and she had the ear of _the_ Red X.

They migrated. They scrapped a living. But they were damn happy while doing it. Perhaps not deliriously joyful—with their experiences, they could never feel like that—but how content did she feel when she heard him play music? How indulgent was she when she allowed him to waste precious days of travel just to sit down and enjoy existing?

He was a dead weight. He acted like a child, sometimes, and reacted with the slow, stunted development of one, too. He was holding her back. He was her responsibility.

He was her brother. He was her friend. He was her everything.

He was simply...Joe.

Not Jericho of the Teen Titans, of their glory days. Not Joseph, that son with the surname of Wilson. Just Joe.

Which was why, one day, Terra was completely unprepared for the forced union of their souls again as Jericho had forcibly _possessed_ her in order to communicate with this damn punk clad in a yellow and red suit.

Yes, a suit. A goddamn hideous costume, like the ones little kids used to wear when playing at superheros and looking up at their mommies and daddies with big, golden eyes, saying, "Mommy? Daddy? When I grow up, I want to be just like _them_!"

Only...he wasn't a kid, but a teenager thinking he was hot stuff and had delusions about being a big, bad Titan. Oh, yes, and he put a certain relic named Cyborg up on a high, high pedestal and worshiped him from afar.

He'd defended Cyborg. He'd..._defended_...Cyborg.

It was utterly incomprehensible. Totally unforgivable.

And then Jericho possessed her. Jericho, not Joe. Not the friend who'd been with her for the last-fucking-decade. Jericho. _Jericho_, the damn Titan. Jericho, who had been so innately good, so superhero naïve. Jericho, who'd been killed by his sadist of a father because that certain _someone_ of a mentor got some sort of kicks and giggles from becoming the government's lapdog and helping them to exterminate metahumans—!

Why else had she joined Mikron's crew? Why else had she become a terrorist with no future ahead of her but the glorious one Mikron set out for each and every one of them?

It was all because of Slade. Slade, who was playing at genocide by helping those self-serving higher up bastards, those men who had the nerve to try and kill them all because of a little _fear_...

To be blunt, if Joe hadn't shown up when he had then she would've still been ripping the globe apart for her master. She would've been driven insane and lived for nothing and no one. She would've probably have lost it at some point and went and blown up the capital or some crazy shit like that. Some suicidal, masochistic mission to _die_.

But that wasn't what she wanted anymore. To just live life, feeling content for the first time in her fucked up life with the person who'd given her that bit of peace...

Understandably, the moment Jericho forgot to watch his back, she seized that opening he'd so generously given her and snatched her own body back.

He'd protested. He'd fought against it, but she only slammed him in a backroom of her mind and tossed up the key somewhere—who cared where? She could find it whenever the hell she felt like it because it was _her_ mind and _her_ body, and Jericho had no right to pull off whatever shit he'd been pulling because she wasn't _buying _it!

Terra, grin wide and eyes maniacal, transformed from that apathetic, mellow woman into the true persona she'd always taken care to keep away from Joe.

To Bart Allen's horrified eyes, she'd become a monster.

* * *

So I lied: Slade did show up. Sorta. This 17 page monster of a chapter is my longest one yet and I'm quite pleased that I've finally got Terra down.

It's mentioned that the first thing Jericho did in Terra's body was to go to the border separating east and west continental USA. That border is government patrolled and is like Korea's 38th parallel line or like the US-Mexico border...as in very, very dangerous. It's meant to keep people in or out. And then consider Nighwing's prowess for having the ability to casually skip through. Cool.

In this universe, that continental border is infamous for the deaths that have occurred from people trying to illegally cross. It has the rep of being the national graveyard. What Terra doesn't mention is that Jericho was trying to find the remains of Kole. In the comics, Kole fell in love with Jericho. I guess they were trying to elope to the east coast or something...anyway, there's the truth of the matter since I didn't feel like breaking up the flow just to include it.

**On Raven:** The disease affected Raven by disrupting Nevermore's structure, which she ended up breaking anyway. Everything in her POV is symbolic and I just chose to throw a dark, repulsive bent on her psyche to signify her not so healthy state of mind. I didn't realize it until after I wrote it, but I think I answered the classic fandom question of "What would happen if Raven's mirror broke?" just not in a literal way. _Technically_, Raven can experience her emotions freely now, but...

Raven's POV is a compression of ten years, starting from when Starfire disappears (very vaguely hinted at) to a few years before the fic begins. Red X doesn't give a damn about her and after she's become worthless to him, he probably abandoned her to that 'asylum' he joked about. Raven is not aware of what the Catalyst is.

I wish I'd finished that Terra-Raven confrontation, but not even I know what happens next. Obviously, Terra escapes and/or beats Raven into submission (kid, kid). The whole point of Terra's rant is to jar Raven from her angst and give her that Titan flare so that she can fight against Warp in How Long Is Forever. Honestly, I don't think Starfire's plaintive pleadings would've been enough to get Raven to stop being a basket case and pull through at the end of the episode.


	14. G'V: Last Machinations

The chapter began with the need to bring the story focus back onto Jinx, as well as connecting her arc with Terra's, but then it turned into something wholly different. I've been meaning to touch upon the real Mikron's brutal exploits for some time now anyway, so I'm pleased.

* * *

She was in her twenties again in lighter times where everything was so simple. Her hair was longer now, but still done up in her customary style, devil horns that drooped over from the weight. Soft, not stiff, but to the child before her, she was the devil itself.

"...I don't like you."

"I don't like you either, kid."

The little boy's face scrunched up into distaste. "Why do you always got to be around here? You're annoy—gah!"

She'd flicked in him the forehead. "Yeah, yeah, you're annoying, too...brat."

With all the indignation of a wronged child, he puffed his cheeks and fixed upon her a frighteningly cute glare. Her answering smile was languid, indulging, but she still shoved the plate towards him. "Eat it. _All_ of it." And then she smirked. "Unless you want to waste the food your precious idol cooked for you."

He swiveled his glare onto the plate of charred _something_. "I...am not eating that."

"Picky, picky." The woman buffed her nails, hardly paying him any attention. "Little brats like you can't possibly appreciate having a superhero finding time out of his busy schedule to cook for you." He bristled at her tone.

Flinging a dramatic finger at her, he said, "You eat it! Your _boyfriend_ made it! Eat it. Eat it!"

She stared at him, incredulous. "Do you want me to die?"

"Then make me something!"

"I don't cook, kid."

"Yeah...you don't cook, you don't clean, you don't do _any_—"

"Finish that thought and you die."

"..." Sullen, he pushed his food around with a fork. "...You suck. Villain."

"Ex-villain, thanks."

"Leave me alone."

"Sorry, but somebody's got to babysit you." Her sigh pronounced, she added, "Besides, it's not like I like doing this. You're monopolizing the person I want the most."

She may have sounded flippant, but there was something about the way she was looking at him that made him stop short.

After a long pause, she added, "I despise you for that. You know."

And his surprised features melded and warped into a familiar costumed face, and those cherub, boyish looks she loved so much suddenly dissipated back into the boy from before. Older now, but not by much.

His features were angry and his suit was as vibrant as ever. He stood before her as she sat, imprisoned, in a cage. This was his second visit and she tired of his interrogation.

She had recognized him from the moment he first stepped through that door into the room that detained her. She refused to acknowledge him, though, refused to call him by name or by his supposed identity.

And her refusal infuriated him. He hadn't 't recognized her at all, but whatever he may have remembered was quickly bulldozed over by his overwhelmingly self-righteous feelings. He saw nothing before him but a villain without a name, a villain whose sole purpose was to help him in his bumbling investigations.

He did not deserve it, her acknowledgment of his superhero identity. He wasn't even aware of the complete and utter burden donning that suit should have been. He was a brat. He was too young. He was naïve. He was an eyesore. He was that splotch of history that should have, otherwise, stayed in the her past. She didn't know why this was happening now of all times. She didn't know why this ghost had to appear now...of all times.

His questions amused her at first. It'd become a game to her to see how far she could go in frustrating him before he gave up. But she'd forgotten the childish superiority baby-faced vigilantes all were afflicted with. She hated it. She hated him, the memories, the old affections for a face long gone. The suit he wore, it was all wrong. This gangly man-child clashed with the person in her dreams, memories, impressions.

He disgusted her.

His questions amused her at first. But she tired of games. She tired of indulging this boy before her; playing at superheros was so pathetic. She wanted to rip and shred that fantasy apart. She wanted to see his despair as she stomped all over his dreams.

He amused her, his questions amused her, but then they turned towards an unpleasant direction.

Fantastical technology that could inject a serum into the bloodstream and cause the victim to erupt in bubbling boils. Pus and sickness and all lethargic death. Explosive vials that had the acidic taint that could kill a man with mere contact. Nameless, scentless gases that entered through the pores, only to forcibly sew them shut through a noxious reaction. A small sample of the biological havoc _that man's _technology was capable of and not even she was aware of all the weapons he'd produced.

She knew only the effects. She'd made it a point to stay far from his weaponry—her goal lied with her to-be husband's killer, not an old teammate's. She didn't give a damn if it was his expertise that was partially at fault for the rotting, foul state of Jump and its sister cities. He wasn't her business anymore. She hadn't thought of him in nearly a decade, not clearly, at least. Not on a conscious level.

But then this brat brought it all back. She hated him for it, just as she hated him when he was a wide-eyed _adorable_ child glorifying in his bastardized, fledging powers.

She'd been jealous. She hadn't been able to admit it at the time, but she had felt threatened by that protegee of his, that boy who would one day walk in his footsteps. First, he had to be trained into a sidekick. And then someday, that little boy would ascend to his mentor's place and take over that lineage.

It was a simple, simple thing. Common, ridiculously so, but that was how the world had worked. And Wally West, in particular, had adored the idea, the concept, the plan, the status quo of participating in such a _superhero thing_. He was...forgetting her.

They'd gone through so much together. Perhaps he was hurt by the estrangement. He was a Titan and yet not a Titan. A fallout. He'd done it all for her. _For her_. He suffered through that awkward and bitter time after he'd hurt their trust, those self-righteous good guys. But she was there for him, wasn't he? She was his life's love. They'd gone through so much together. He was able to put her life straight, and she was grateful to him and adored him even more.

She was the only one by his side, the only one he could depend on. None of his allies understood the extent he went for her. He cited it was love. She was his support pillar. She never turned her back on him, never wasting his sacrifices. They'd been living together, she and him, and she loved it, loved that they were finally together.

No disease would have been able to pull them apart, surely. But he was prone to overprotective tendencies—as if she would go away. She would never leave him. Literally or metaphorically, it wasn't _possible_. To save her, he hurt his reputation and stoically bore through his decision of teaming up with villains.

The Titans had been so lost, so confused, and so hurt. But they knew nothing. They knew _nothing_.

Gizmo liked to play with things he shouldn't have played with at all. It would've been so easy to coax and tempt the boy into stealing that virus off of the Brotherhood. It would've been so easy to manipulate him through his greed. For a few years after the theft, he experimented and learned and played with it to his heart's content, spurred on by the betrayal of his one female teammate. And then the disease was released, stolen from _him_, and she caught it. Simple as that.

Afterwards was a whirlwind of events not even she knew the full extent of. Gizmo had been terrifying in his own right, the fury of having been used by an organization long dealt with and maybe even the guilt of having her potential death on his hands? They weren't so close as to have an explicit bond, but they were once teammates, unconscious allies in a world growing rapidly more and more hostile towards people like them. It didn't even matter if she was running with the good guys or _dating_ an honorary Titan. It made it worse, actually. That scrutiny.

And then...he found out, that charming silver-tongued man who had been able to bring her over to his side. That charismatic, easygoing smile disappeared. He changed.

Had she not been in a fatal situation, surely the secrecy and the betrayal of trust would have dissolved their relationship. He never understood why she never told him from the start. Neither did she. Perhaps she was afraid of her fairytale ending shattering before her eyes. Perhaps she'd been wallowing in denial.

Perhaps she was keeping it a secret from him because she was trying to punish him for putting another person into his heart.

It didn't matter by then anyways. The moment he found out how frantically she'd been keeping this disease from him, he confronted her. It was painful, of course. A lot of tense silences with meaningful glances and gazes that communicated far more between them than words would have been able to. A lot of bitter, acidic twangs in the back of their throats. A lot of hurt.

But then sometime, somewhere, along the way, he not only willingly broke ties and communication with the Teen Titans, but he full-heartedly joined her old side. She'd been so thrown by that abrupt decision. She remembered how he said nothing before he disappeared with an old teammate she had no clue how to treat.

Gizmo, who had then been conflicted with leaving an old traitor of a teammate to die or to help bother to clean up his own mess, was shocked to the core when the boyfriend of said teammate suddenly appeared out of nowhere in his home.

H.I.V.E. Academy had long been dissolved, their headmaster gone missing, and the H.I.V.E. Five was now truly made up of five members. Gizmo was the leader and he'd transformed them into a ruthless team, an aggressive, no-mercy policy group. It hadn't taken much effort either because everyone had been smarting in their own way by their former leader's betrayal. Her flippant disregard of them had been something wholly unexpected, and the final battle of the Brotherhood of Evil versus the Teen Titans opened their eyes to a lot of things.

All Gizmo had done was rerouted their priorities, just as he rerouted the unexpected hurt and anger and frustration from her betrayal into determination and cold resolve. What had she always preached and ranted to them? About how they were lazy, purposeless group of pathetic mini-villains? Was that what she said? Well, he would show her differently. He would show her that she would regret ever double-crossing the H.I.V.E. Five.

That was how he felt.

And things had been going well. He had a new virus to play with, a biological tool that he was wholly inexperienced with. But he learned. He experimented. He played and played and played until he convinced himself that her death was necessary and that any old _friendship_ or _ties_ with their old leader was obsolete. Completely and utterly.

At one point, he wondered why the hell the Brotherhood had this little project of theirs hidden away in their arsenal. This could have been used for great and devastating effect on the enemy. This could have been used to wipe out all of those pesky magic users the good guy side was littered with. This could have been used to analiate that annoying bitch among the immediate Teen Titans, the one they so depended on as a healer.

What were they thinking, Gizmo wondered, putting this weapon into reserve?

An unfinished, incomplete project. Unstable, but the possibilities were endless. He hadn't ever thought of biological warfare before because his expertise was with machines and the mechanical nature of his tech. _That_ was his trademark, after all, but could he break his own reputation and shock the world with his power?

Could he finally become someone to be feared?

And...could he finally get rid of this empty, gaping _hurt_ in him that he had no idea what to do about? How impotent he was when he couldn't even properly handle these agonizing feelings in him after she left. He wanted it to stop, that spiraling, aching out-of-control sensation in his head that wouldn't let him just sit down and plot out her demise.

But, ah. This was different. This was the _Brotherhood's_ pet project so neatly handed off to him. He could continue their work. He could become a name to fear. He could finally _succeed_ where that traitorous wannabe fake villainess had not. And he would start with her.

But then that damnable thief destroyed all his efforts, erased his datebase, and stole the one thing that would act as the impetus for his extraordinary debut into the world. That damnable thief. Who, who was it? Who? Who had the nerve to do such a thing. Who the _fuck_ would impede his progress, stop him from reaching the height of his capacity?!

And then that thief stole it from him, the chance to kill Jinx. He _stole_ his moment of glory. That bastard stole...her.

It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair.

Nothing was fair.

That falling sensation was happening again where he'd become all choked up and unable to speak or breathe—that spiraling, out-of-control sense that seized his mind and made him unable to think. It was happening again. She was dying. Surely. She was dying and that victory was taken from him—_why, why, why_.

But the guilt, he was unprepared to feel that guilt.

And then the Flash showed up on his doorstep, the strangest expression on his face, as he _demanded_ the villain's help.

If only he knew who had been the propagator of his girlfriend's disease. Wally West wouldn't have let him walk out of that building alive. But he hadn't known, and Gizmo was strangely relieved.

Which made him weak. Because he was afraid—afraid of a _superhero_? How stupid. Heroes weren't frightening at all because they were goodie goodies and self-righteous and had the full and loving support of the people. Superheroes could do no wrong and were the figureheads of Justice and crap like that.

So there was no need to be afraid. Not at all. It was ridiculous, really, to look upon that bright and shining face and be _scared_.

But he was. He was, he was, _he was_ because that wasn't the honorary Titan _Kid Flash_ on his doorstep or the glorious and magnificent _Flash_, the patron of Central City. It was...

It was Jinx's lover, the guy who would rip the earth apart to save her.

What a cute, sweet ordeal. Or at least it should have been. But the guy looking to draft Gizmo of the H.I.V.E. Five into his grand slam of a journey wasn't cute or sweet. He wasn't even fully a _good guy_ either because that savage grin he wore didn't suggest he wasn't _above_ using any technique possible to get from Point A to Point B.

The means justified the end. That man felt just like that, and Gizmo was unwillingly enthralled.

To what extent would the Flash go? It was something he wanted to see. He wanted to see how twisted and cruel a man could become for the ironic sake of saving a loved one. He wanted to see that glorious transformation from the goody-goody good guy who _ripped_ Jinx away from them to a man Gizmo could possibly admire.

He wanted to see it. He wanted to see the complete and utter fall of Wally West.

This was the superhero who had broke convention and created controversy by dating an ex-villainess. This was the man who had to nerve to place her as his first priority and justice second.

It would be interesting, would it not, to see what would become of him at the end of their journey?

But there was a personal stake in this situation as well. Gizmo finally learned the name of the thief who so wronged him.

His old headmaster. The one called Blood.

And just as Jinx's lover was hellbent on destroying this man and dragging all the cure and answers out of him first, Gizmo relished in the thought of revenge.

He would let the Flash scurry all across the world to rip apart all of Brother Blood's hideouts. And then once they would confront Blood, once West had all of his useless answers, Gizmo would kill them both. He wanted to see it! He wanted to see the expression on the Flash's face right before he betrayed him. He wanted that bastard to know the extent of his ire and pain and hatred for taking Jinx away from them—from _him_.

And once that business would be dealt with, the old geezer would be next.

And then after that? After that...

After that...Jinx would be left to die. Jinx would die. She would finally, finally die.

It was a heady thought. It enthralled him more than the possibility of seeing Wally West turn dark.

Only—he didn't expect another teammate to betray him. He never would have thought that _Kyd Wykkyd_ would go behind his back—_their _backs—and sneak around to help Jinx. That villain knew things, things none of the others possibly knew, but it was completely unexpected when he used those very same things to save her.

Irony. That the Flash would be beaten by a villain...that Kyd Wykkyd, the most logical and compliant and ruthless one of them all, would cave into old feelings and _save_ the traitor.

It was—unexpected. They had self-preservation instincts, they all did. But every villain was out for themselves _except_ _them _because Gizmo held them together and made them strong. He was responsible for forcing them to pick themselves off. They should've been grateful to him. He was their leader, and his word was law.

And Kyd Wykkyd betrayed them. Another traitorous teammate...but Kyd Wykkyd betrayed them at a dear cost.

While Gizmo was gleefully working with the Flash, Kyd Wykkyd had been busy trying to save _her_, their old leader. The end product was infuriating—that Jinx would be able to walk free while Kyd Wykkyd would be inflicted with her disease in turn? That everything that had made him _worth_ anything would be gone and locked away in a child's mind? Who the hell had expected him to regress into that body? What kind of twisted magical law was at work that would render a once useful ally into an empty headed, blank faced child?

Weak. Worthless—how the _fuck _was Gizmo supposed to take revenge if the ignorant brat had no idea what he was paying his life for?!

What the hell was he supposed to do now?

It was _this _scene he returned to from his alliance with West. They'd tracked Blood down, who then had _somehow_ been audacious enough to kill the superhero before Gizmo could. Again, Gizmo was robbed of another potential satisfaction. Furious, he attacked.

The old geezer fled, laughing and taunting and _taunting_.

Gizmo had come back frustrated beyond words. His H.I.V.E. Five faction was slowly being reduced to some useless child's plaything. He was unprepared to deal with the super deformed Kyd Wykkyd or how to deal with his underlings' frantic news of that event. He was unprepared to encounter the entire wrath of the Teen Titans, who had _somehow_ got it into their heads that he was responsible for stealing Wally West away from them. He was also unprepared to deal with the sudden strain on the relationship he was forming with a new supplier situated in Steel City.

Red X was demanding that he accept Jinx back.

What the hell.

In Jinx's grief-stricken AWOL absence, she'd apparently stumbled onto Red X's home and somehow got his new and tentative supplier to take her under his wing. Somehow, Red X convinced her to become a villainess again. Somehow, she agreed, throwing all of her dead boyfriend's values out the window.

It was more than mind blowing—it was mind fuckery at its finest, and Gizmo didn't buy it for a minute. And Red X was expecting him to _take her back?_ And ignore her betrayal? Ignore everything these past years had stood for?

Red X didn't do something so petty as to deny his services to Gizmo. Instead, he easily turned right around and betrayed Gizmo's expectations.

Gizmo had no time to deal with an errant dealer. It was that man's business after all—distasteful, but none of his business. He didn't want anything to do with Jinx anymore. He was sick of the name, actually, and quite tired of her flippant, fleeting whims.

Perhaps even the Flash's sacrifice had been in vain. It was a surprisingly bitter thought. Her superhero boyfriend had crossed taboos after taboos for her, toeing the line between righteous and corrupt, and it was all for nothing?

It was not only a bitter revelation, but a disappointing one as well. Her double crossing turnaround revealed how irrevocably pointless it was to waste anymore time on her. He was done playing around with her. He was through. He left her there to rot on that highway to Steel and swore to himself, again, that it was none of his business.

He turned his attentions to his original goal—making himself more powerful, more well known, and more and more influential. He'd long been interested in the fledging H.I.V.E. organization Jinx had been starting up again, but found its pathetic villains fall short.

A useless bunch who sought her out for protection in the face of the government's new iron-fisted administration and policies.

He'd been, naturally, disappointed. He wondered what that man Blood would have thought of this bastardized version of his grand academy.

And then the government started to act...interesting.

He merged his crew with Jinx's, and realized she was not truly dark. She didn't have any of the aspirations he had, but she was showing promising signs of a cutthroat mentality. This new Jinx, this pathetic, grieving one, had hardened and become cold under Red X's hands. It was interesting, interesting! That smuggler had molded her into something worthwhile after all.

Something...potentially usable.

He didn't bother much with her plans. She wanted to provide a _haven_ and to give asylum to fellow persecuted villains, but he wanted none of that. He didn't place any worth into metahumans who couldn't even protect themselves. However, he had encountered the few worthwhile villains at the new H.I.V.E..

The ones who thirsted for revenge, but had none of the means or discipline to do so. The ones who'd grown to hate the government and wanted to revolutionize the H.I.V.E. into an army that could fight back. The angry ones. The hardened ones. Yes—Gizmo wanted to use those kinds of people.

They would help him realize his dream.

His meager faction made up originally of three villains grew to enormous proportions. It grew rapidly, and it was far too easy to spread rumors of discontent in the body of the H.I.V.E.. A split was slowly growing, and Mikron was on the non-stagnant, winning side. He broke off and formalized his group into something to be feared.

Jinx was angry, naturally, but she was too short-sighted, too naïve, to think that he would be her support pillar for forever. He was finished with her. He was not out to be her friend. He had plans, plans that needed to be put into effect immediately, and she had no part in these plans.

The stupid girl eventually followed him. An unexpected, duly noted surprise. Perhaps there were some last vestiges of her good guy stint still in her—perhaps she was afraid of being alone again, of being abandoned.

Was she so desperate to turn to him as her savior? She would soon learn that rousing sleeping feelings of anger and betrayal was not a good idea.

She was just asking to be used, and so Mikron obliged her.

First phase of his plans was to be subtle and gradual, slinking and creeping and entrenching into the cracks and holes the country left open for them. It was a phase that required patience and time. His men were restless, but then so was he. This was also the time where he scouted for other like minded villains and weeded out the weaker ones in his entourage. He had to find people who realized the importance of first settling down so deeply and firmly that they could never be moved from their foundations.

A passive stage? Hardly. It was not only a transition period of transforming his men's mentality and preparing them for he ordeal ahead, but it was also a calculated move to attack the government with a hit-and-run tactic. He would train his men in this way, let them gain experience, and allow them to feel and taste and just begin to grasp the hidden future that he was presenting to them. It allowed them to vent, with glee, their anger against the structure that wanted to destroy them.

Jinx's abilities as a hacker was an asset for him. It had given her temporary reprieve among his allies, but he was hardly amused when she balked at the more ruthless moves on his part. Her first assignments were simple—bankrupt a company here and there. It was hardly something to offend even her sensibilities.

But it was the little things that turned her off, he guessed. The clever embezzlement used to fund inhumane experiments, ones indulging in his biologically inclined weaponry. The heinous kidnappings, ones that inevitably tore happy families apart and definitely immoral when the victims were sold elsewhere or out of the country. The not-so subtle terrorism he employed when he began to hire out Terra Markov's creativity, until she'd become one of the crew.

The first phase, The Counterattack, was so fun. His subordinates agreed, those mindless, brutal men. He'd ensnared their loyalty and used them to the fullest. And if Jinx was suddenly indecisive over where _her_ loyalties were supposed to be...well, then, he'd have to cut her loose. She was a liability—what, with her flitting whims.

She'd fled before he could do anything, though, like the double crossing traitor she was.

He proceeded with his second phase, The Takeover.

Terra Markov, his passionate second-in-command, did not disappoint him. It was truly her time to shine when she was ordered to wreak as much havoc as she wished. And she did, even with their shaky relationship, she threw herself into his mission with a fervor he didn't understand, but saw as an opportunity. Her inner demons chased her this far into his cause, so Mikron found no reason not to trust her when he was the only one giving her life a purpose. He was not blind to what he was providing for her useless life.

The country was fairly falling apart with its panic at this point, and it had been easy to get there. Laughably so. A crumbling house of cards that was quickly degenerating into chaos—then somehow, somewhere along the way, his name got out into the public.

The media had frantically seized upon this threat that was no longer unnamed while politicians had run about left and right, powerless and helpless.

But the true terror laid in the west coast. Wild, crazed plans of quarantine and the like were suggested, but not everybody was quite willing to accept this radical plan of cutting off nearly half of the country. It was like No Man's Land all over again, but much worse.

And it was glorious.

With his men infiltrating all levels of society, it added to the panic as neighbor turned against neighbor, and every civilian was seized with a terror not unlike the 50's paranoia about the spread of communism. Superheroes were beginning to lose their prestige as Mikron shrewdly revealed, twice fold in one move, the government's dirty secret of villain eradication and his men's own metahuman status. He played the public, and it was glorious.

Mikron honestly never had given a damn about the villains who were executed rather than imprisoned. In his eyes, they were weak for getting caught in the first place. He was advocating to put a stop to the government's corruption, and many of his subordinates were passionately fighting for this cause, but he didn't care. It was a propaganda tool for him, a way to manipulate the metahumans at his beck and call.

It was nearing the end of the second year of the quaint media-termed Catalyst when everything suddenly all went to hell.

Terra Markov, his passionate second-in-command, hadn't disappointed him when she was a mercenary and hadn't disappointed him still when she'd finally become his close subordinate.

As per his orders, she rooted out Xenothium for experimental purposes. He knew the results of combining its devastating power with his technology would be beyond words. It had not only been used as a tentative fuel years before, but with his intelligence and tenacity to make something out of the raw material other than fuel, it had infinite potential.

And it was all his at his command.

It was a heady feeling to know that all of his aspirations would finally be realized. And it was utterly satisfying to know that he did it all with his own power.

Still, he had the vague sense that he should be prepared to abort the mission immediately if need be. His men were like drones—they couldn't survive without being led like blind, hapless sheep. All of his hard work would be rendered useless if he happened to _die_ before the final curtain call. He didn't even consider the possibility of being captured anytime during his efforts to bring his plans to fruition.

If he had to, he would even scar the earth itself. His name would be remembered forever and he would've ultimately succeeded in his goals, even if he did end up dead.

This was his obsession, what he lived and breathed for...to be never forgotten. He would never be lost within the obscure pages of history. He would accomplish what countless of villains had tried to do before him—he would rule the world.

Not physically. He would never manage to enslave an entire planet, and he had absolutely no desire for such a tired old cliché as that, but his legacy would haunt tens of millions of people and he would never be forgotten.

He would live on, thriving in the terror of old memories. He would live on, lurking underneath generation old fear even as this age's posterity would appear. He would live on, the first to have accomplished such a worldly feat.

He would become immortal. His name would be known.

And his contingency plan, prepared for the unthinkable possibility of his too early demise, would be placed entirely in the hands of an unknowing Terra Markov.

If need to be, she would be the one to suffer his last and greatest manipulation and become the trigger for his last and greatest experimentation. If he died before he could properly see to the end of his operation, then he would be assured in the success of a backup plan that would guarantee his name would never be lost.

And if he did die before his intended time, then he would take the whole damn world with him.

* * *

Finally. Gizmo, exposed. Clearly, he's not an anti-hero. Terra's arc will reveal what was Gizmo's last intentions for her—which succeeded, FYI. I feel really bad for Jinx, though, who's had misconceptions about Gizmo from the very start. In the end Gizmo's motives may be cliché, but it's evolved and spiraled completely out of control from the simple hurt he felt from her Season 5 betrayal. But, man, I love him to bits.

The point of reintroducing Bart was to shed a different, negative light on Jinx's relationship with Wally. I'm glad I finally got his death out of the way, however depressing it may be, but a Wally West-Gizmo alliance makes me happy because it's so unusual. And, no, Wally didn't die dark (Harry Potter terms beware); he was thinking about Jinx all the way through.


End file.
